









~r 4 o 3 '7-. "I o A I. 






G^ ^> A <. -o.»- G % ^o r 

o j^ *^_ G o j 



°^ \° -7", ^ O^ > 



^ 



i0 ^ 5 ' 

V. °^ ,/ ^>!^*- "W 



^ 



** ^ \m^/ «e °^ -J 







1 aO" 



o > 



y ^ * ^ 



^ 
<?-. 






vv 



P. : 



^o« 



c 



V c 









^5 °^ 




^ A^ ^ 



^ 
•^ 



5>^ 



"»• «■ ~a 



<: 







^ *«»: %/ 



<*. 









y% 




ENGLAND AND GERMANY 



ENGLAND AND 
GERMANY 



BY 

DR. E/VdILLON 

WITH AN INTRODUCTION 
BY 

The Hon. W. M. HUGHES, M.P. 

PRIME MINISTER OF AUSTRALIA 



BRENTANO'S CHAPMAN & HALL LTD. 

NEW YORK LONDON 

1917 



-*fl5#? 






in 



Printepi in Great Britain by 

Richard Clay & Sons, Limited, 

brunswick st., stamford st., s.e., 

and bungay 8uffolk. 



J V /£p 






TO 

H.S.H. ALICE 

PRINCESS OF MONACO 

THIS PARTIAL PRESENTMENT OF THE 

BEGINNINGS OF A WORLD 

CATACLYSM 



INTRODUCTION 

Behind any human institution there stand 
a few men — perhaps only one man — who direct 
its movement, protect its interests, or serve 
as its mouthpiece. This applies to nations. 
If we wish to know for what a nation stands 
and what are its ideals and by what means 
it seeks to realise them, we shall do well to 
know something of the men who lead its 
people or express their feelings. 

It is of vital importance that we should 
understand the attitude of every one of the 
nations — both friends and enemies — involved 
in this war. For in this way only can we 
know what is necessary to be done to achieve 
victory. 

And the remarkable man who has written 
this book knows those who lead the warring 
nations in this titanic conflict very much 
better than ordinary men know their own 
townsmen. 

Dr. Dillon has moved through the chancel- 
leries of Europe. He has seen and heard what 
has been denied to all but very few. In the 
Balkans, that cauldron of racial passions which, 
overflowing, gave our enemies an ostensible 
cause for this war, he moved as though an in- 
visible and yet keenly observant figure. He 

vii 



viii INTRODUCTION 

could claim the friendship of Venizelos and 
other Balkan statesmen. He has travelled as 
a monk throughout the mountain fastnesses, 
he has slept in the caves of Albania. He 
understands the people of all the Balkans, 
speaks their tongues as a native, and knows 
and assesses at their true value their leaders. 

At the time of the murder of the Archduke 
Ferdinand and the Archduchess, Dr. Dillon 
was in Austria, and he remained there through 
those long negotiations in which Germany 
tenaciously clung to her design of war. 

How well he knows Germany let his book 
speak. His knowledge of Russia is profound. 
A master of many languages, he occupied a 
chair at the Moscow University for many 
years, and his insight into Russian politics is 
deep. 

In this book he speaks out of the depth of 
his knowledge, and tells the people of Britain 
what this war means to them, and what needs 
to be done before we can hope for victory. 
He speaks plainly because he feels strongly. 

It may be that we cannot agree with him in 
everything that he says. But no one, after 
reading Dr. Dillon's remarkable book, will any 
longer regard the war as but a passing episode. 
It is a timely antidote to that fatal delusion. 

For this war is a veritable cataclysm, and 
the future of the world hangs upon the result. 
We must change our lives. Insidiously, while 
we have called all foreigners brothers and 
sought foes amongst ourselves, the great force 
of barbarism, in a new guise and with enormous 



INTRODUCTION ix 

power of penetration and annexation, has 
worked for our undoing. This force now 
stands bared, in the hideous bestiality of 
Germany's doctrine of Might, and it can be 
defeated only by an adaptation of its methods 
that will leave nothing as it was before. 

Dr. Dillon's unfolding of the story of German 
preparation is, it will be admitted, one of 
fascinating interest. Of its value as a contri- 
bution to political and diplomatic history it 
is not for me to speak. But to its purpose in 
keying all men to the pitch; all to a sense of 
the great events in which we are taking part, 
I bear my testimony. " Germany is wholly 
alive, physically, intellectually, and psychic- 
ally. And she lives in the present and future " 
(p. 312). And the living force of Germany 
requires us to rise to the very fulness of our 
powers; for as the champions of truth and 
right we must prove ourselves physically and 
morally stronger than the champions of soulless 
might. 

Germany is wholly alive; but she is alive 
for evil. We whose purpose is good, whose 
cause is justice and whose triumph is indis- 
pensable if honest industry and human right 
are not to disappear from mankind, are as yet 
not fully alive to the immensity and necessity 
of our task. We must awaken, or be awakened, 
ere it be too late. 

Germany is living in the present and in the 
future. It is a present of determined effort, 
of unlimited sacrifice, of colossal hope. The 
future for which she strives and suffers is a 



x INTRODUCTION 

future incompatible with those ideals which 
our race cherishes and reveres. Either our 
philosophy, our religion and code prevail, or 
they fade into decay, and Germany's aims 
remain. The choice is definite. 

There can be no parley, no compromise with 
the evil thing for which Germany fights. There 
is not room for both. One must go down. 

We must win outright. And we can and 
shall win — if we bend every thought, our whole 
will, our every energy, our utmost intensity of 
determination to the great work. Failing this, 
we shall secure only a victory equivalent to 
defeat. We chose the part of free men, and, 
when purified by complete self-sacrifice, shall 
emerge from the ordeal a great and regenerated 
people. 

W. M. Hughes. 



CONTENTS 



CHAP. PAGE 

INTRODUCTION BY THE HON. W. M. HUGHES vii 

I THE CHARACTER OF GERMANY . . . 1 

II THE GERMAN SYSTEM OF PREPARATION . 7 

III GERMANY AND ITALIAN FINANCE . . 27 

IV THE ANNEXATION MANIA .... 37 
V GERMANY AND RUSSIA .... 53 

VI THE STATESMANSHIP OF THE ENTENTE . 81 

VII TEUTON POLITICS ..... 88 

VIII A MACHIAVELLIAN TRICK BY WHICH RUSSIA'S 

HAND WAS FORCED .... 99 

IX GERMAN PROPAGANDA IN SCANDINAVIA . 108 

X GERMANY AND THE BALKANS . . .116 

XI THE RIVAL POLICIES ..... 136 

XII PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP .... 146 

XIII PROBLEMS OF FINANCE .... 161 

XIV READJUSTMENTS 175 

XV THE POSITION OF ITALY . . . .192 

XVI ROUMANIA AND GREECE . . . .214 

xi 



xii CONTENTS 

CHAP. 

xvii Germany's resourcefulness 

XVIII THE PERILS OF PARTY POLITICS 

XIX PAST AND PRESENT . 

XX PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 

XXI THE FINAL ISSUE 



PAOB 

227 
236 
246 
272 

296 



OURSELVES AND GERMANY 
CHAPTER I 

THE CHARACTER OF GERMANY 

During the memorable space of time that 
separates us from the outbreak of the cata- 
strophic struggle, out of which a new Europe 
will shortly emerge, events have shed a partial 
but helpful light on much that at the outset 
was blurred or mysterious. They have belied 
or confirmed various forecasts, fulfilled some 
few hopes, blasted many others, and obliged 
the allied peoples to carry forward most of 
their cherished anticipations to another year's 
account. Meanwhile the balance as it stands 
offers ample food for sobering reflection, but 
will doubtless evoke dignified resignation and 
grim resolve on the part of those who con- 
fidently looked for better things. 

The items of which that balance is made 
up are worth careful scrutiny for the sake of 
the hints which they offer for future guidance. 
The essence of their teaching is that we Allies 
are engaged not in a war of the by-past type 
in which only our armies and navies are con- 
tending with those of the adversary according 
to accepted rules, but in a tremendous struggle 
wherein our enemies are deploying all their 
resources without reserve or scruple for the 
purpose of destroying or crippling our peoples. 



2 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Unless, therefore, we have the will and the 
means to mobilize our admittedly vaster 
facilities and materials and make these sub- 
servient to our aim, we are at a disadvantage 
which will profoundly influence the final 
result. It will be a source of comfort to 
optimists to think that, looking back on the 
vicissitudes of the first twenty months' cam- 
paign, they can discern evidences that there 
is somewhere a statesman's hand methodically 
moulding events to our advantage, or at- 
tempering their most sinister effects. Those 
who fail to perceive any such traces must 
look for solace to future developments. For 
there are many who fancy that the economy 
of our energies has been carried to needless 
lengths, that the adjustment of means to 
ends lacks thoroughness and precision, and 
that our leaders have kept over rigorously 
within the narrow range of partial aims, in- 
stead of surveying the problem in its totality 
and enlarging the permanent efficacy of their 
precautions against unprecedented dangers. 

The twenty months that have just lapsed 
into history have done much to loosen the 
hold of some of the baleful insular prejudices 
which heretofore held sway over the minds 
of nearly all sections of the British nation. It 
may well be, therefore, that we are now better 
able to grasp the significance of the principal 
events of the war, and to seek it not in their 
immediate effects on the course of the struggle, 
but in the roots — still far from lifeless — whence 
they sprang. For it is not so much the up- 
shot of the first phases of the campaign as the 
deep-lying causes which rendered them a fore- 
gone conclusion that force themselves on our 
consideration. Those causes are still opera- 



THE CHARACTER OF GERMANY 3 

tive, and unless they be speedily uprooted will 
continue to work havoc with our hopes. 

It is now fairly evident that the present 
war is but a violent phase in the unfolding 
of a grandiose ground idea — the subjugation 
of Europe by the Teuton — which was being 
steadily realized ever since the close of the 
Franco-German campaign of 1870. It is like- 
wise clear that, despite her " swelled head," 
Germany's estimate of her ability to try issues 
with all continental Europe was less erroneous 
than the faith of her destined victims in their 
superior powers of resistance. The original 
plan, having been limited to the continental 
states, was upset by Great Britain's co-opera- 
tion with France and Russia. But, despite 
this additional drag, Germany has achieved the 
remarkable results recorded in recent history. 
And with some show of reason she looks for- 
ward to successes more decisive still. For in 
her mode of conceiving the problem and her 
methods of solving it lie the secret of her 
progress. But there, too, is to be found the 
counter-spell by which that progress may be 
effectually checked; and it is only by master- 
ing that secret and applying it to the future 
conduct of the struggle that we can hope to 
ward off the dangers that encompass us. 

Germany is like no other State known to 
human history. She exercises the authority 
of an infallible and intolerant Church while 
disposing of the flawless mechanism of an 
absolute State. She is armed with the most 
deadly engines of destruction that advanced 
science can forge, and in order to use them 
ruthlessly she mixes the subtlest poisons to 
corrupt the wells of truth and debase the 
standards of right and wrong. And this she 



4 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

can do without the least qualms of conscience, 
in virtue of her firm belief in the amorality 
of political conduct. Her members at home 
and abroad, whose number is not fewer than 
a hundred and twenty millions, form a political 
community of whose compactness, social sense 
and single-mindedness the annals of the human 
race offer no other example. All are fired by 
the same zeal, all obey the same lead, all work 
for the same object. She sent and is still 
sending forth missionaries of her political 
faith, preachers of the gospel of the mailed 
fist, to every country in which their services 
may prove helpful. Diplomatists, journalists, 
bankers, contrabandists, social agitators, spies, 
incendiaries, assassins and courtesans, willing 
to offer up their energies and their lives in 
order to circumvent, despoil or slay the sup- 
posed enemies of their race, address themselves 
each one to his own allotted task and discharge 
it conscientiously. 

Those German colonists abroad are the eyes 
and arms and tongues of the monster organism 
of which the brain-centre is Berlin. They 
endeavoured to stir up dissension between 
class and class in Russia, France, Britain, 
Belgium, to plant suspicion in the breast of 
Bulgaria and Roumania, to create a prusso- 
phile atmosphere in Greece, Switzerland and 
Sweden, and to bring pressure to bear on the 
Government of the United States in the hope 
of fomenting discord between the American 
and British peoples. They have occupied posts 
of influence in the Vatican, are devoted to 
the Moslem Caliph, cultivate friendship with 
the Senussi and the ex-Khedive of Egypt, are 
intriguing with the Negus of Abyssinia, and 
spreading lying rumours, false news and vile 



THE CHARACTER OF GERMANY 5 

calumnies throughout the world. During the 
years that passed between the war of 1870 
and the outbreak of the present European 
struggle, that stupendous organism contrived 
by those and kindred means to possess itself 
of the principal strongholds of international 
opinion and influence, the centres of the chief 
religions, the press, the exchanges, the world's 
" key industries," the great marts of com- 
merce and the banks. It has friends at every 
Court, in every Cabinet, in every European 
Parliament, and its agents are alert and active 
in every branch of the administration of 
foreign lands. And while suppleness marked 
their dealings with others, they were inflexible 
only in their fidelity to the Teuton cause. 
Thus in Russia they were conservative and 
autocratic in their intercourse with the ruling 
spheres, and revolutionary in their relations 
with the Socialists and working classes; in 
France and Britain they were democrats and 
pacifists ; in Italy they were rabid nationalists 
or neutralists according to the political sen- 
timents of their environment; in Turkey, 
Morocco, Egypt and Persia staunch friends 
of Islam. They intrigued against dynasties, 
conspired against cabinets, reviled influential 
publicists, fostered strikes and tumults, set 
political parties and entire states by the ears, 
dispelled grounded suspicions and armed 
various bands of incendiaries and assassins. 

But in spite of cogged dice and poisoned 
weapons, the comprehensive way in which 
the enterprise was conceived, the consummate 
skill with which it was wrought out towards 
a satisfactory issue, the whole-heartedness of 
the nation which, although animated by a 
fiery patriotism that fuses all parties and 



6 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

classes into one, is yet governed with military 
discipline, offer a wide field for imitation and 
emulation. For the changes brought about 
by the first phases of the war are but fruits 
of seed sown years ago and tended ever since 
with unfailing care, and unless suitable imple- 
ments, willing hands and combined energies 
are employed in digging them up and casting 
them to the winds, the second crop may prove 
even more bitter than the first. 



CHAPTER II 

THE GERMAN SYSTEM OF PREPARATION 

On the historic third of August when war 
was formally declared, its nature was as little 
understood by the Allies as had been its 
imminence. The statesmen who had to full- 
front its manifestations were those who had 
persistently refused to believe in its possi- 
bility, and who had no inkling of its nature 
and momentousness. Most of them, judging 
other peoples by their own, had formed a high 
opinion of the character of the German nation 
and of the pacific intentions of its Government, 
and continued to ground their policy in war 
time on this generous estimate, which even 
when upset by subsequent experience still 
seems to linger on in a subconscious but not in- 
operative state. At first their preparations to 
meet the emergency hardly went beyond the 
expedients to which they would have resorted 
for any ordinary campaign. In this they re- 
sembled a sea-captain who should make ready 
to encounter a gale when his ship was threatened 
by a typhoon. Hence their unco-ordinated 
efforts, their chivalrous treatment of a das- 
tardly foe, their high-minded refusal to 
credit the circumstantial stories of sickening 
savagery emanating first from Belgium and 
then from France, their gentle remonstrances 
with the enemy, their carefully worded argu- 
ments, their generous understatement of their 

7 



8 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

country's case, and their suppression of any 
emotion among their own folk akin to hatred 
or passion. In an insular people for whom 
peace was an ideal, neighbourliness a sacred 
duty, and the psychology of foreign nations 
a sealed book, this way of reading the bear- 
ings of the new situation and adjusting them 
to the nation's requirements was natural and 
fateful. 

To the few private individuals who had the 
advantage of experience and were gifted with 
political vision the crisis presented itself under 
a different aspect. Some of them had fore- 
seen and foretold the war, basing their fore- 
cast on the obvious policy of the German 
Government and on the overt strivings of 
the German nation. They had depicted that 
nation as intellectual and enterprising, abun- 
dantly equipped with all the requisites for an 
exhausting contest, fired with enthusiasm for 
a single idea — the subjugation of the world — 
and devoid of ethical scruple. And in the 
clarion's blast which suddenly resounded on 
the pacific air they recognized the trump of 
doom for Teuton Kultur or European civiliza- 
tion, and proclaimed the utter inadequacy of 
ordinary methods to put down this titanic 
rebellion against the human race. That has 
been the gist of every opinion and suggestion 
on the subject put forward by the writer of 
these lines since the outbreak of the war. 

But even without these repeated warnings 
it should have been clear that a carefully calcu- 
lating people like the Germans, in whom the 
gift of organizing is inborn and solicitude for 
detail is a passion, would not embark on a 
preventive war without having first established 
a just proportion between their own equipment 



SYSTEM OF PREPARATION 9 

for the struggle and the magnitude of the 
issues dependent on its outcome. It was, 
further, reasonable to assume that this was 
no mere onset of army against army and 
navy against navy according to the old rules 
of the game, but a mobilization by the two 
military empires of all their resources — mili- 
tary, naval, financial, economic, industrial, 
scientific and journalistic — to be utilized to 
the fullest for the destruction of the Entente 
group. It was also easy to discern that, 
whichever side was worsted, the Europe which 
had witnessed the beginning of the conflict 
would be transfigured at its close, and that 
Germany would, therefore, not allow her 
freedom of action in conducting the war to 
be cramped by sentimental respect for the 
checks and restraints of a political system that 
was already dead. Lastly, it might readily 
be inferred that the huge resources hoarded 
up by the enemy during forty years of pre- 
paration would be centupled in value by the 
favourable conditions which rendered them 
capable of being co-ordinated and directed by 
a single will to the attainment of a single end. 
All these previsions, warranted then by un- 
mistakable tokens, have since been justified 
by historic events, and it is to be hoped that 
the practical conclusions to which they point 
may sink into the minds of the allied nations 
as well as of their Governments, now that 
nearly two years have gone by since they 
were first expressed. 

The earliest impression which German mo- 
bilization left upon the Allies was that of the 
preventive character of this war. For it could 
have had no other mainspring than a resolve to 
paralyse the arm of the Entente, which, if 



10 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

allowed to wax stronger, might smite in lieu of 
being smitten. For the moment, however, 
Germany was neither attacked nor menaced. 
Far from that, her rivals were vying with each 
other in their strivings to maintain peace. Her 
condition was prosperous, her industries thriv- 
ing, her colonial possessions had recently been 
greatly increased, her influence on the affairs of 
the world was unquestioned, her citizens were 
materially well-to-do, her workmen were highly 
paid, her capitalists, seconding her statesmen 
and diplomatists, had, with gold extracted 
from France, Britain and Belgium, woven a 
vast net in the fine meshes of which most of 
the nations of Europe, Asia and America were 
being insensibly trammelled. Already her 
bankers handled the finances, regulated the 
industries and influenced the politics of those 
tributary peoples. And by these tactics a 
relationship was established between Germany 
and most states of the globe which cut deep 
into the destinies of these and is become an 
abiding factor of the present contest. For 
that reason, and also because of the para- 
mount influence of the economic factor on the 
results of the struggle, they are well worth 
studying. 

To her superior breadth of outlook, mar- 
vellous organizing powers, the hearty co- 
operation between rulers and people, and the 
ease with which, unhampered by parliamentary 
opposition, her Government was enabled to 
place a single aim at the head and front of 
its national policy, Germany is perhaps more 
deeply indebted for her successes during the 
first phases of the campaign than to the strategy 
of Hindenburg or the furious onslaughts of 
Mackensen. German diplomacy has been ridi- 



SYSTEM OF PREPARATION 11 

culed for its glaring blunders, and German 
statesmanship discredited for its cynical con- 
tempt of others' rights and its own moral obli- 
gations. And gauged by our ethical standards 
the blame incurred was richly deserved. But 
we are apt to forget that German diplomacy 
has two distinct aspects — the professional 
and the economic — and that where the one 
failed the other triumphed. And if success 
be nine-tenths of justification, as the Prussian 
doctrine teaches, the statesmen who preside 
over the destinies of the Teutonic peoples have 
little to fear in the way of strictures from 
their domestic critics. For they left nothing 
to chance that could be ensured by effort. 
Trade, commerce, finances, journalism, science, 
religion, the advantages to be had by royal 
marriages, by the elevation of German princes 
to the thrones of the lesser states, had all been 
calculated with as much care and precision 
as the choice of sites in foreign countries for 
the erection of concrete emplacements for 
their monster guns. No detail seemed too 
trivial for the bestowal of conscientious labour, 
if it promised a possible return. When in 
doubt whether it was worth while to make an 
effort for some object of no immediate interest 
to the Fatherland the German invariably de- 
cided that the thing should be done. " You 
never can tell," he argued, " when or how it 
may prove useful." For years one firm of 
motor-car makers turned out vehicles with 
holes, the object of which no one could guess 
until the needs of the war revealed them as 
receptacles for light machine-guns. 

Nearly two years of an unparalleled struggle 
between certain isolated forces of the Allies 
and all the combined resources of the Teutons 



12 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

ought to banish the notion that the results 
achieved are the fruits only of Germany's 
military and naval efficiency. In truth, the 
adequacy of her military and naval forces con- 
stitutes but an integral part of a much vaster 
system. It has hitherto been the fashion 
among British and French writers to dwell 
exclusively on the comprehensiveness of the 
measures adopted by the Germans to fashion 
their land and sea defences into destructive 
implements of enormous striking power and 
scientific precision. But the German concep- 
tion of the enterprise was immeasurably more 
grandiose. It included every means of offence 
and defence actually available or yet to be 
devised, and testifies to a grasp of the nature 
of the problem which, so far as one can judge, 
has not even yet been attained outside the 
Fatherland. As the present situation and its 
coming developments present themselves as 
practical corollaries of causes which the leaders 
of Germany rendered operative, it may not 
be amiss to describe these briefly. 

The objective being the subjugation of 
Europe to Teutonic sway, the execution of 
the plan was attempted by two different sets 
of measures, each of which supplemented the 
other : military and naval efficiency on the 
one hand and pacific interpenetration on 
the other. The former has been often and 
adequately described; the latter has not yet 
attracted the degree of attention it merits. 
For one thing, it was unostentatious and 
invariably tinged with the colour of legitimate 
trade and industry. Practically every country 
in Europe, and many lands beyond the seas, 
were covered with networks of economic rela- 
tions which, without being always emanations 



SYSTEM OF PREPARATION 13 

of the governmental brain, were never devoid 
of a definite political purpose. While Great 
Britain, and in a lesser degree France, dis- 
tracted by parliamentary strife or intent on 
domestic reforms, left trade and commerce 
to private initiative and the law of supply 
and demand, the German Government watched 
over all big commercial transactions, interwove 
them with political interests, and regarded 
every mark invested in a foreign country 
not merely as capital bringing in interest in 
the ordinary way, but also as political seed 
bearing fruit to be ingathered when Der 
Tag should dawn. Thus France and Britain 
advanced loans to various countries — to 
Greece, for instance — at lower rates of interest 
than the credit of those states warranted, 
but they bargained for no political gain in 
return. Germany, on the contrary, insisted on 
every such transaction being paid in political 
or economic advantages as well as pecuniary 
returns. And by these means she tied the 
hands of most European nations with bonds 
twisted of strands which they themselves were 
foolish enough to supply. Italy, Russia, 
Turkey, Roumania, Bulgaria, Greece, Belgium 
and the Scandinavian States are all instruc- 
tive instances of this plan. Bankers and 
their staffs, directors of works and factories, 
agents of shipping companies, commercial 
travellers, German colonies in various foreign 
cities, military instructors to foreign armies, 
schools and schoolmasters abroad, heads of 
commercial houses in the different capitals, 
were all so many agencies toiling ceaselessly 
for the same purpose. The effect of their 
manoeuvres was to extract from all those 
countries the wealth needed for their subju- 



14 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

gation. One of the most astounding instances 
of the success of these hardy manipulations is 
afforded by the Banca Commerciale of Italy, 
which was a thoroughly German concern, 
holding in its hands most of the financial 
establishments, trades and industries of Italy. 
This all-powerful institution possessed in 1914 
a capital of £6,240,000 of which 63 per cent, 
was subscribed by Italian shareholders, 20 per 
cent, by Swiss, 14 per cent, by French, and 
only 2j per cent, by Germans and Austrians 
combined ! And the astounding exertions put 
forward by the Germans during the first 
twelvemonth of the war are largely the pro- 
duct of the economic energies which this line 
of action enabled them to store up during the 
years of peace and preparation. 

The execution of those grandiose schemes 
was facilitated by the easy access which Ger- 
many had to the principal markets of the globe. 
One of the main objects of her diplomacy had 
been to break down the tariff barriers which 
would have reserved to the great trading 
empires the main fruits of their own labour and 
enterprise. By the Treaty of Frankfort the 
French had been compelled to confer on Ger- 
many the most-favoured-nation clause, thus 
entitling her to enjoy all the tariff reductions 
which the Republic might accord to those 
countries with which it was on the most amic- 
able terms. British free trade opened wide 
the portals of the world's greatest empire to a 
deluge of Teuton wares and to a kind of com- 
petition which contrasted with fair play in a 
degree similar to that which now obtains be- 
tween German methods of warfare and our 
own. Russia, at first insensible to suasion and 
rebellious to threats, endeavoured to bar the 



SYSTEM OF PREPARATION 15 

way to the economic flood on her western fron- 
tiers, but during the stress of the Japanese 
war she chose the lesser of two evils and 
yielded. The concessions then made by my 
friend, the late Count Witte, to the German 
Chancellor, drained the Tsardom of enormous 
sums of money and rendered it a tributary to 
the Teuton. But it did much more. It sup- 
plied Germany with a satisfactory type of 
commercial treaty which she easily imposed 
upon other nations. Germany's road through 
Italy was traced by the mistaken policy of the 
French Government which, by a systematic 
endeavour to depreciate Italian consols and 
other securities, drove Crispi to Berlin, where 
his suit for help was heard, the Banca Com- 
merciale conceived, and commercial arrange- 
ments concluded which opened the door to 
the influx of German wares, men and political 
ideals. 

A few years sufficed for the fruits of this 
generous hospitality to reveal themselves. The 
influx of wealth and the increased population 
helped to render the German army a match for 
the combined land forces of her rivals, a for- 
midable navy was created, which ranked im- 
mediately after that of Great Britain, and a 
large part of Europe was so closely associated 
with, and dependent on, Germany that an ex- 
tension of the Zollverein was talked of in the 
Fatherland, and a league of European brother- 
hood advocated by the day-dreamers of France 
and Britain. The French, however, never 
ceased to chafe at the commercial chain forged 
by the Treaty of Frankfort, but were powerless 
to break it, while the British lavished tributes 
of praise and admiration on Germany's enter- 
prise, and construed it as a pledge of peace. 



16 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Russia, alive to the danger, at last summoned 
up courage to remove it, and had already de- 
cided to refuse to extend the term of the 
ruinous commercial treaty, even though the 
alternative were war. That was the danger 
which stimulated the final efforts of the 
Kaiser's Government. 

Thus the entire political history of Entente 
diplomacy during this war may be summarized 
as a series of attempts on the part of the 
Allies to undo some of the effects of the master- 
strokes executed by Germany during the years 
of abundance which she owed to the favoured- 
nation clause, British free trade and kindred 
economic concessions. Interpenetration is the 
term by which the process has been known ever 
since Count Witte essayed it in Manchuria and 
China. 

The German procedure was simple, yet effec- 
tive withal. Funds were borrowed mainly in 
France, Britain, Belgium, where investors are 
often timid and bankers are unenterprising. 
And then operations were begun. The first 
aim pursued and attained was to acquire con- 
trol of the foreign trade of the country experi- 
mented on. With this object in view banks 
of credit were established which lavished on 
German traders every help, information and 
encouragement. Men of Teuton nationality 
settled in the land as heads of firms, as clerks 
without salary, private secretaries, foremen, 
correspondents, and rapidly contrived to get 
command of the main arteries of the economic 
organism. German manufactures soon flooded 
the country, because those who undertook to 
import them could count on extensive credit 
from the institutions founded with the money 
of the very nations whose trade they were 



SYSTEM OF PREPARATION 17 

engaged in killing. In this way the compe- 
tition, not only of all Entente peoples but also 
of the natives of the country experimented 
on, was systematically choked. And the cus- 
tomers of these banks, natives as well as 
Teutons, became apostles of German influence. 

Insensibly the great industrial concerns of 
the place passed into the possession of Ger- 
man banks, behind which stood the German 
empire. A nucleus of influential business 
people, having been thus equipped for action, 
incessantly propagated the German political 
faith. German schools were established and 
subsidized by the Deutscher Schulverein, clubs 
opened, musical societies formed, and news- 
papers supported or founded, to consolidate 
the achievements of the financiers. On political 
circles, especially in constitutional lands, the 
influence of this Teutonic phalanx was pro- 
found and lasting. 

In all these commercial and industrial enter- 
prises undertaken abroad for economic gain 
and political influence, the German State, its 
organs and the individual firms, went hand in 
hand, supplementing each other's endeavours. 
The maxim they adopted was that of their 
military commanders : to advance separately 
but to attack in combination. Not only the 
Consul, but the Ambassador, the Minister, 
the Scholar, the Statesman, nay the Kaiser 1 
himself, were the inspirers, the partners, the 
backers of the German merchant. Marschall 
von Bieberstein once told me in Constantinople 
that his functions were those of a super-com- 
mercial traveller rather than ambassadorial. 
And he discharged them with efficiency. Laws 

1 The Kaiser is one of the largest shareholders in the 
great mercury mines of Italy. 



18 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

and railway tariffs at home, diplomatic facilities 
and valuable information abroad smoothed 
the way of the Teuton trader. Berlin rightly 
gauged the worth of this pacific interpenetration 
at a time when Britons were laughing it to 
scorn as a ludicrous freak of grandmotherly 
government. To-day its results stand out in 
relief as barriers to the progress of the Allies 
in the conduct of the war. 

Of this ingenious way of enslaving foreign 
nations unknown to themselves, Italy's experi- 
ence offers us an instructive illustration. The 
headquarters of the German commercial army 
in that realm were the offices of the Banca Com- 
merciale in Milan. This institution was founded 
under the auspices of the Berlin Foreign Office, 
with the co-operation of Herr Schwabach, 
head of the bank of Bleichroder. Employing 
the absurdly small capital of two hundred 
thousand pounds, not all of which was German, 
it worked its way at the cost of the Italian 
people into the vitals of the nation, and finally 
succeeded in obtaining the supreme direction 
of their foreign trade, national industries and 
finances, and in usurping a degree of political 
influence so durable that even the war is 
supposed to have only numbed it for a time. 

Between the years 1895 and 1915 the capital 
of this institution had augmented to the sum 
of £6,240,000, of which Germany and Austria 
together held but 2| per cent., while con- 
trolling all the operations of the Bank itself 
and of the trades and industries linked with it. 

The Germans, as a Frenchman wittily re- 
marked, are born with the mania of annexa- 
tion. It runs in their blood. And it is not 
merely territory, or political influence, or the 
world's markets that they seek to appropriate. 



SYSTEM OF PREPARATION 19 

Their appetite extends to everything in the 
present and future, nay, even in the past 
which they deem worth having. It is thus 
that they claim as their own most of Italy's 
great men, such as Dante, Giotto, Leonardo da 
Vinci, Botticelli, Galileo, and it is now asserted 
by a number of Teuton writers that Christ 
Himself came of a Teutonic stock. 

German organisms, as well as German states- 
men, display the same mania of annexation, 
and the Banks in especial give it free scope. 
German banks differ from French, British and 
Italian in the nature, extent and audacity of 
their operations. It was not always thus. 
Down to the war of 1870 their methods were 
old-fashioned, cautious and slow. From the 
year 1872 onward, however, they struck out 
a new and bold course of their own from which 
British and French experts boded speedy 
disaster. Private enterprises were turned into 
joint stock companies, the capital of pros- 
perous undertakings was increased and gigantic 
operations were inaugurated. Between the 
years 1885 and 1889 the industrial values 
issued each year reached an average of 1,770 
million francs; between 1890 and 1895 the 
average rose to 1,880 millions, and from 1896 
to 1900 it was computed at 2,384 millions. 1 

Of all German financial institutions the 
most influential and prosperous is the Deut- 
sche Bank. It has been aptly termed an 
empire within the empire. Its capital, 250 
million francs, exceeds that of the Reichsbank 
by thirty millions. It is the first of the six 
great German banks, of which four are known 
as the " D " group, because the first letter of 

1 Cf. V Invasione tedesca in Italia. Ezio M. Gray. 
Firenze. 



20 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

their respective names is D : Deutsche Bank, 
Dresdner Bank, Disconto-Gesellschaft and 
Darmstadter Bank. The other two are the 
Schaffhausenscher Bankverein and the Berliner 
Handelsgesellschaft. The total capital of these 
six concerns amounts to 1,100 million francs. 1 

None of these houses is hampered by those 
rules, traditions or scruples which limit the 
activity of British joint stock banks. They 
are free to launch into speculations which, to 
the sober judgment of our own financiers, 
must seem wild and precarious, but to which 
success has affixed the hall-mark of approval. 
Each of the six banks is a centre of German 
home industries and also of the foreign trans- 
formations of these. To mention an industry 
is almost always to connote some one of the 
six. Before the war broke out one had but 
to gaze steadily at the beautiful facade of this 
or that Russian bank to discern the Lamia- 
like monster from the banks of the Spree. 
The famous firm of Krupps, for instance, had 
its affairs closely interwoven with those of 
the Berliner Disconto Gesellschaft, and was 
more than once rescued from bankruptcy by its 
timely assistance. Similar help was afforded 
to the celebrated firm of Bauer which is known 
throughout the world for its synthetical 
medicines. There were critical moments in 
its existence when it was confronted with 
ruin. The Bank extricated the firm from 
its difficulties, and the present dividend of 
33 per cent, has justified its enterprise. 

In this way the latter-day German banks 

upset all financial traditions, opened large 

credits to industries, smoothed the way for 

the spread of German commerce, killed foreign 

1 Op. cit., p. 113. 



SYSTEM OF PREPARATION 21 

competition and seconded the national policy 
of their Government. As an instance of the 
push and audacity of these modernized insti- 
tutions, a master stroke of the Bank of Behrens 
and Sons of Hamburg may be mentioned : it 
bought up the entire coffee crop of Guatemala 
one year to the amazement of its rivals and 
netted a very large profit by the transaction. 

Now as commerce is international and in- 
dustry depends for its greatest successes upon 
exportation, it was inevitable that the up-to- 
date German banks should seek fields of 
activity abroad and aim at playing a com- 
manding part in the world's commerce. And 
they tried and succeeded. For they alone 
instinctively divined the new spirit of the 
age, which may be termed co-operative and 
agglutinative. It was in virtue of this new 
idea that groups of States were leagued to- 
gether by Germany in view of her projected 
war, and it is the same principle that impels 
her, before the conflict has yet been decided, 
to weld to herself as many tributary peoples as 
she may to assist her in the economic struggle 
which will be ushered in by peace. Germans 
first semiconsciously felt and now deliberately 
hold that in all departments of modern life, 
social, economic and political, our conception 
of quantities must undergo a radical change. 
The scale must be greatly enlarged. The unit 
of former times must give place to a group of 
units, to syndicates and trusts in commerce 
and industry, to trade unions in the labour 
world, to Customs-federations in international 
life. That this shifting of quantities is a 
correlate of the progress achieved in technical 
science and in means of communication, and 
also of the vastness of armies and navies and 



22 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

of the aims of the world's foremost peoples, 
is since then become a truism, realized not 
only by the Germans but by all their allies. 

For individual enterprise, as well as for 
national isolation, there is no room in the 
modern world. Isolation spells weakness and 
helplessness there. The lesser neutral States 
must of necessity become the clients of the 
Great Powers and pay a high price for the 
protection afforded them. Hence the main- 
tenance of small nations on their present basis, 
with enormous colonies to exploit but without 
efficient means of defending them, forms no 
part of Germany's future programme. And 
the altruistic professions of the Entente which 
claims to be fighting for the rights of little 
States, whose idyllic existence it would fain 
perpetuate, is scoffed at by the Teutons as 
chimerical or hypocritical. When this war is 
over, whatever its upshot, Central Europe with 
or without the non-German elements will have 
become a single unit, against whose combined 
industrial, commercial and military strivings no 
one European Power can successfully compete. 
And the difficulties which geographical situa- 
tion has raised against effective co-operation 
among the Allies in war time will make them- 
selves felt with increased force during the 
economic struggle which will then begin. 

No mere tariff arrangement, but only a 
genuine league between all the west European 
Powers and the British Empire, supplemented 
by a customs union between them and the 
other Allies of the Entente, will then avail 
to ward off the new danger and establish some 
rough approach to the equilibrium which the 
present conflict has overthrown. The future 
destinies of Europe, as far as one may con- 



SYSTEM OF PREPARATION 23 

jecture from the data available to-day, will 
depend largely on the insight of the Entente 
nations and their readiness to subordinate 
national aims and interests to those of the 
larger unit which will be the inevitable product 
of the new order of things. 

The ideal type of the industrial bank having 
been thus wrought out, the Germans, whom a 
thoroughly commercial education had qualified 
for the work, carried on vast operations with 
a degree of boldness which was matched only 
by the thoroughness of their precautions. 
They advanced money with a readiness and 
an open-handedness which the West European 
financier set down as sheer folly, but which 
was the outcome of close study and careful 
deliberation. They began by acquainting 
themselves with the solvency of their clients, 
with the nature of the transactions which these 
were carrying on, with their business methods 
and individual abilities, and to the results of 
this preliminary examination they adjusted 
the extent of their financial assistance. They 
had secret inquiry offices to keep them con- 
stantly informed of the condition of the 
various firms and individuals, and when in 
doubt they demanded an insight into the 
books of the company which was seldom 
denied them. The Spanish Inquisition was 
but a clumsy agency in comparison with the 
perfect system evolved by these German banks, 
which could at any given moment sum up the 
prospects as well as the actual situation of 
each of their customers. It was this compre- 
hensive survey which warranted some of the 
large advances they made to seemingly in- 
solvent firms which afterwards grew to be the 
most prosperous in the Fatherland. 



24 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

The methods thus practised at home were 
adhered to in all those foreign countries which 
the German financier, manufacturer or trader 
selected for his field of operations. A bank 
would be opened in the foreign capital with 
money advanced mainly by one of the six 
great financial institutions. It would be called 
by some high-sounding name, suggestive of 
the country experimented upon, and little 
by little the German capital would be dimin- 
ished to a minimum and local capital substi- 
tuted, but the supreme control kept zealously 
in the hands of the Teuton directors. In- 
dustries would then be financed and finally 
bought up. Others would also be financed 
but deliberately ruined. Competition would 
in this way be effectively killed, and little by 
little the life-juices of the country would be 
canalized to suit the requirements of German 
trade, industry and politics. 

If an industry in the invaded country was 
judged capable of becoming subsidiary to some 
German industry, the Bank would maintain it 
for the purpose of amalgamating the two later 
on, or else having the foreign concern absorbed 
by the Teutonic. This was a labour of patriot- 
ism and profit. But if the business was 
recognized as a formidable rival to some 
German enterprise, it was doomed. The pro- 
cedure in this case was simple. The Bank 
advanced money readily, tied the firm finan- 
cially, rendering it wholly tributary ; and then 
when the hour of destiny struck, the credit 
was suddenly withdrawn and the curtain rung 
up in the Bankruptcy Court. When this con- 
summation became public, the unsuspecting 
foreigner would ask with naive astonishment : 
" How can it be bankrupt ? I understood that 



SYSTEM OF PREPARATION 25 

Germans were financing it." They were, and 
it was precisely for that reason, and because it 
was on the way to prosperity as a rival to some 
German firm, that it was suffocated. 1 

This ingenious system proved exceptionally 
effective in Brazil. It has been said that that 
republic is become a dependency of Germany. 
What cannot be gainsaid is that about one- 
third of Brazil's national debt 2 is owing to 
German bankers, and the whole financial and in- 
dustrial movement of the country is swayed by 
the Society of Colonization which is German, 
by the German Society for Mutual Protection, 
by the German-Brazilian Society and by the 
three Navigation Companies whose steamers 
ply between Brazil and the Fatherland. 3 It 
is because of the far-reaching power and in- 
fluence which has accrued to Germany from 
this successful invasion that Professor Schmol- 
ler of the Berlin University could write : "It 
behoves us to desire at any and every cost 
that, by the next century, a German land of 
twenty or thirty million inhabitants shall 
arise in Southern Brazil. It is immaterial 
whether it remains part of Brazil or consti- 
tutes an independent State or enters into close 
relations with the German Empire. But with- 
out a connection guaranteed by battleships, 
without the possibility of Germany's armed 
intervention in Brazil, its future would be 
jeopardized." 

It is the Monroe doctrine that is commonly 
credited with thwarting these designs on South 
America. But as a matter of plain fact, it is 
to the British Navy and to nothing else that 
the credit is due. Were it not for the known 

1 Cf. Ulnvasione tedesca in Italia, pp. 118, 119. 

2 1050 million francs. 3 Op. cit., p. 120. 



26 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

resolve of the British nation to co-operate in 
case of need with the American people in their 
exertions to uphold that doctrine against Ger- 
many, the Berlin Cabinet would long ago have 
formally established a firm footing in Southern 
Brazil and the United States Government would 
have been powerless to prevent it. 1 

1 An instructive article on the subject by Mr. Moreton 
Frewen appeared in the Nineteenth Century of February, 
1916. 



CHAPTER III 

GERMANY AND ITALIAN FINANCE 

It was in congmity with those principles 
and methods that the Banca Commerciale, 
which had its headquarters in Milan, set itself 
to discharge the complex functions of a finan- 
cial, industrial, commercial and political agency 
of German interpenetration in Italy. 

To German customers and those Italians 
who imported German goods, the Banca Com- 
merciale allowed long credits and easy means 
of payment. To all who were in need of im- 
plements, machinery, or materials for a new 
enterprise, the bank "recommended" German 
houses, and those who were wise construed the 
" recommendation " as an ultimatum. For if 
it was ignored, their names were inscribed on 
the black books of the bank, and by means 
of an efficacious system of secret dossiers, 
handled by a confidential information bureau, 1 
they found themselves thrust into a " credit 
vacuum," boycotted by finance and condemned 
to bankruptcy. All banks shunned them. 

1 This secret information bureau is everywhere a 
potent engine of attack in German hands. It renders 
deliberate libellers and defamers immune against the 
action of the law. The victims feel the effects but 
cannot point to the cause. The fiches, as the certificates 
are called, are couched in conventional terms and bear 
no signature. In the case of persons whom the bank 
desires to ruin, these documents are sentences of com- 
mercial death. 

27 



28 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Their bonds became mere scraps of paper. 
Every enterprise to which they set their hands 
was blighted, and nothing remained for them 
but to abandon their avocations or surrender 
at discretion. 

But besides this executive of destruction 
there was another and still more important 
board, whose work was wholly constructive. 
It was commonly known as the " service of 
information." Its functions were to collect at 
first hand all useful data about Italian com- 
merce and industry, to draw up tabulated 
reports for the use of Germans at home 
engaged in trade and industry. These lists 
indicated current prices, the qualities of the 
goods in demand, the favourite ways of pack- 
ing and consigning these, samples of manufac- 
tures, statistics of production, the addresses of 
all firms dealing with Italians — in a word, every 
kind of data calculated to enable German trade 
and industry to compete successfully with 
their rivals. The manner in which this body 
of information was drawn up, sifted, classified, 
and made accessible, deserves unstinted ad- 
miration. To say that commercial espionage 
was practised largely in the working of this 
comprehensive system is but another way of 
stating that it was German. 

The Banca Commerciale, which was the 
head and centre of this organization, was, as 
a matter of course, called Italian. For every 
similar institution, commercial, journalistic or 
other, which has for its object the realization 
of the Teutonic plan of internationalization, 
invariably wears the mask of the nationality 
of the country in which it operates. And in 
this case the mask was supplied by Italians, 
on whom the bank bestowed all the highest 



GERMANY AND ITALIAN FINANCE 29 

honorary posts, while reserving the influential 
ones for Germans and Austrians. Thus the 
moving spirits of this vast organization were 
Herrn Joel, Weil and Toeplitz, men of uncom- 
mon business capacity, who devoted all their 
time and energies to the attainment of the 
end in view. And their zeal, industry and in- 
genuity were rewarded by substantial results, 
which have left an abiding mark on Italian 
politics and entered for a great deal into the 
attitude of the nation towards the two groups 
of belligerents. In a relatively short span of 
time foreign competition in Italian markets was 
checked, German products ousted those of their 
rivals, and at last the very sources of Italy's 
economic life were in the hands of the Teuton, 
whose continued good-will became almost a 
vital necessity to the struggling nation. 

Already in the year 1912 Germany stood 
first among Italy's customers, whether we con- 
sider the list of her exports or that of imports. 
Italy bought from that empire goods valued 
at 626,300,000 francs, and sold it produce worth 
328,200,000 francs; whereas Great Britain, 
who supplies Italy with the bulk of her coal, 
exported only 577,100,000 francs worth, while 
her imports were valued at 264,400,000 francs. 
For France the figures were 289,600,000 and 
222,600,000 francs respectively. 

The method by which Italian industries were 
assailed, shaken, and then purchased and con- 
trolled by this redoubtable organization, bore, 
as we saw, all the marks of German commercial 
ethics. Sharp practice which recognizes as its 
only limitation the strong arm of the penal 
law, is a fair description of the plan of campaign. 
Against this insidious process none of the 
native enterprises had the strength to offer 



30 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

effective resistance. One by one they were 
drawn into the vast net woven by the three 
German Fates — Joel, Weil and Toeplitz. The 
various iron, mechanical and shipbuilding 
works, which represented the germs from which 
native industries were to grow, were sucked 
into the Teuton maelstrom. The larger and 
the smaller steamship navigation companies 
likewise fell under the direction of the Banca 
Commerciale, which permitted some of them 
to exist and even to thrive up to a certain 
point, beyond which their usefulness to the 
general plan would have turned to harm. In 
this way Italy's entire mercantile marine be- 
came one of the numerous levers in the hands 
of the interpenetrating German. And the im- 
portance of this lever for political purposes 
can neither be gainsaid nor easily overstated. 

In every little town and village which sends a 
quota of emigrants to the transatlantic liners, 
agents of the various steamship companies 
are always about and active. Being intelli- 
gent and enterprising, their influence on local 
politics is irresistible, and it was uniformly 
employed in those interests which it was the 
object of the Banca Commerciale to further. 
" This institution," writes an Italian expert, 
who has studied the subject with unusual care, 
" being the mistress of the dominant economic 
organisms of the nation, makes use of them to 
carry out a germanophile policy. It employs 
them for the purpose of exercising a directive 
action in all elections, commercial, provincial 
and general. Every servant of a steamship 
navigation company, every purveyor of emi- 
grants is at the same time and by the very force 
of things an electoral agent. The position of 
arbitress and mistress of the steamship com- 



GERMANY AND ITALIAN FINANCE 31 

panies carries with it possession of the keys 
of the national wealth, and is consequently a 
formidable weapon of aggressive competition 
against all industries, Italian and foreign, which 
are not affiliated to those of Germany. The 
Banca Commerciale, having obtained that su- 
premacy, forced the Italian companies to lead 
a languishing existence in straitened circum- 
stances, whereas they might easily have grown 
rich and flourishing. It permits our steamship 
companies to subsist and even to earn some- 
what, but only just enough to suffice for the 
declaration of a modest dividend. That is why 
Italian navigation companies levy such exces- 
sive rates of freight, why their service is not 
organized in accordance with rational and latter 
day standards, why they take no thought of 
winning foreign markets or of national expan- 
sion. 1 They have no means of consigning 
merchandise at the domicile, so that the con- 
signees are put to enormous expense for col- 
lection and delivery. And to make matters 
still worse, Italian navigation companies are 
bound with those of Germany by special secret 
conventions, which oblige them to abandon to 
their rivals certain kinds of merchandise of the 
Near and the Far East." 

If we examine the peculiarly Teuton ways 
of trade competition in their everyday guise, 
and without the glamour of political ideals 
to distract our attention, we are confronted 
with phenomena of a repulsive character. For 
the German's keen practical sense, his sus- 
tained concentration of effort on the further- 
ance of material interests, and his scorn of 
ethical restraints render him a formidable 

1 Cf. Preziosi, La Germania a la Conquista delV Italia, 
p. 57 fol. 



32 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

competitor in pacific pursuits and a dangerous 
enemy in war. His moral sense is not so much 
dulled by experience as warped by education. 
It may be likened to a clock which has not 
stopped but shows the wrong hour. He has 
been taught that there are times and circum- 
stances when religious and ethical standards 
may or must be set aside, and he arrogates to 
himself the right of determining them. With- 
out examining into stories of preternatural 
meanness and perfidy which have come into 
vogue since the outbreak of the war, it is fair 
to say that dirty tricks, destructive of all 
social intercourse, formed part of the German 
commercial procedure in France, Britain and 
Russia, the only proviso being that they were not 
penalized by the criminal law of the country. 

An amusing but nowise edifying instance 
turns upon Paris fashions. That Berlin, like 
Vienna, should seek to vie with Paris in setting 
the fashion of feminine finery to the world is 
conceivable and legitimate. But that Germans 
should compete with Paris in Paris fashions 
connotes a psychological frame of mind which 
is better understood by the inmates of a prison 
than by a mercantile community. American 
ladies visiting the French capital to order their 
gowns are astonished to note that no fashions 
really new have been shown to them in the great 
Paris houses. They had just seen them all in 
the German capital. And the Paris models 
destined to be placed on the market next season 
turn out to be identical with those which the 
fair visitors had already inspected in Berlin 
and could have purchased there at a much 
lower price. How this could be is explained 
simply. A German merchant in continuous 
relations with the staffs of the Paris firms 



GERMANY AND ITALIAN FINANCE 33 

clandestinely obtains from some of the mem- 
bers for a high price the models which are still 
being kept secret, has them copied in large 
numbers in Berlin and sold at a cheap price. 
True, the German workmanship lacks the 
dainty finish of the Paris article, but the 
difference is such as appeals only to the eye 
of a connoisseur. 

In Italy similar phenomena were observed 
frequently. A firm in Florence celebrated 
for special types of wooden utensils which 
were never successfully imitated elsewhere 
was ruined by commercial espionage. One 
day the proprietor engaged the services of 
two foreign workmen who laboured hard and 
steadily for some time and then departed, to 
his great regret. Six months later Germany 
dumped on the Italian markets the very same 
articles in vast quantities, and at a price so 
low that the Italian firm could not hope to 
compete with them. At first, indeed, the 
Florence house made a valiant stand against 
the invasion, but had finally to give up the 
fight as hopeless. Later on the proprietor 
learned that the two honest-looking workmen 
were first-class German engineers, whose only 
objects in entering his service were to acquaint 
themselves with his methods, copy his models 
and then strangle his trade. And these objects 
they achieved to their satisfaction. 1 

Thus, in order to strangle concerns that 
compete with them successfully, the average 
German merchant sticks at nothing. His 
maxim is, that in trade as in all forms of the 
struggle for existence, necessity knows no law. 
And he is himself the judge of necessity. The 
history of German industry in Italy is full of 
1 Ulnvasione tedesca, p. 147. 

D 



34 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

instructive examples of this disdain of moral 
checks, but one will suffice as a type. It 
turns upon the struggle which the Teuton in- 
vaders carried on against the Italian iron 
industry, which for a while held its own 
against all fair competition. In their own 
country, the German manufacturers sold 
girders at £6 10s. the ton. The profits made 
at this price enabled them to offer the same 
articles in Switzerland for £6, in Great Britain 
for £5 3s. and in Italy for £3 15s. Now, as 
the cost of production in Germany fluctuated 
between £4 55. and £4 155. per ton, it is evident 
that the dead loss incurred by the German 
manufacturers on Italian sales varied between 
105. and £l per ton. But this sacrifice was 
offered up cheerfully because its object was 
the destruction of the growing iron industry of 
Northern Italy and the clearing of the ground 
for a German monopoly. 1 The spirit that 
animates the Teuton producer, in his capacity 
as rival, was clearly embodied by one of the 
principal manufacturers of aniline dyes in 
Frankfort, who remarked to an Italian business 
man : "I am ready to sell at a dead loss for 
ten years running rather than lose the Italian 
market, and if it were necessary I would give 
up for the purpose all the profits I have made 
during the past ten years." 2 To contend with 
any hope of success against men of this stamp, 
one should be imbued with qualities resembling 
their own. And of such a commercial equip- 
ment the business community of Great Britain 
have as yet shown no tokens. 

In Italy the Banca Commerciale was wont 
to send to every firm, whether it had or had 

1 Vlnvasione tedesca in Italia, p. 149. 

2 Op. cit., p. 150. 



GERMANY AND ITALIAN FINANCE 35 

not dealings with it, a tabulated list of ques- 
tions to be answered in writing. The ostensible 
object was to obtain trustworthy materials 
to serve for the Annual Review of the economic 
movement in the country published every 
year by the Bank. In reality the ends achieved 
were far more important, as we may infer from 
the use to which all such information in France 
was put. There the well-known agency of 
Schimmelpfeng, which was in receipt of a 
subvention from the German Chamber of 
Commerce, was a centre of secret information 
respecting the solvency, the prospects, the 
debts and assets of every firm in France, and 
its tabulated information about French com- 
merce and industry, together with all the 
knowledge that had been secretly gleaned, 
was duly sent to Berlin. 

Russians complain somewhat tardily of the 
prevalence of the same system among them- 
selves. " Every day," writes the Novoye 
Vremya, " fresh details are leaking out respect- 
ing a certain German firm, ideal in its resource- 
fulness, which succeeded in spreading a vast 
net over all Russia. It has been satisfactorily 
established that Germans occupied many re- 
sponsible posts in the organization, and that 
these 1 officials were subjects of the German 
Empire. At the head of the entire business 
in Russia down to a recent date was also a 
German subject." The kind of information 
gathered by the agents of the company, " for 
business purposes," is clear from a circular 
issued by the firm just a fortnight before the 
outbreak of the war. 

1 It is an American Company for the sale of certain 
machines. The Russian organ mentions all the names. 
For my purpose this is unnecessary. The curious may 
find them in the Novoye Vremya of 5/18 August, 1915. 



36 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

THE FIRM OF XYZ 

"Tula, 

" 5/18 July, 1914. 

" District Card for the Collectors of the Circuit. 

" Form N 246. 

" We have forwarded you to-day a number of 
cards of the printed form N 246, which you are 
requested to have filled in at once and placed 
at the head of form 490 of the corresponding 
district. We draw your attention herewith 
to the necessity of enumerating on the first 
table of form N 246 all the villages and other 
places of the circuit of each district collector, 
whether or no they contain debtors of ours, 
and of stating in the second table the number 
of inhabitants. The registration is to be done 
by the official charged with that part of the 
work : each circuit is to be entered separately 
and the villages and places it contains to be 
given in alphabetical order. These lists are 
to be verified every six months and fresh 
information set out respecting the growing 
number of our debtors. We request you to take 
this work in hand at once and without delay. 

"The Control Department, Tula." 

When this circular was published in Moscow 
the general director of the firm wrote to certain 
provincial newspapers pointing out that the 
company is American, not German. "It is 
curious," a Russian journal remarks, "that an 
American firm should need a map containing 
all the villages and hamlets of the districts, 
with the number of their inhabitants, irre- 
spective of the presence there of the company's 
debtors." 1 

1 Novoye Vremya, 5/18 July, 1916. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE ANNEXATION MANIA 

Another instructive example of the Annexa- 
tion mania, as it displays itself in German 
commercial undertakings, comes to us from 
Russia. 

It is only one of many, a typical instance 
of a recognized method. The Franco-Russian 
joint - stock company Provodnik is known 
throughout Europe. It manufactures tyres 
and other rubber wares. The capital, which 
amounted to only 700,000 roubles at the date 
of its foundation, in the year 1888, had in- 
creased to 22,000,000 by the time when 
war was declared. It is closely connected 
with another company named the Buffalo, 
which has its headquarters in Riga and was 
promoted by the President of the Provodnik, 
M. Wittenberg, together with several Aus- 
trian capitalists. M. Wittenberg is President 
of both companies, and the Provodnik has 
assisted the Buffalo on various occasions, even 
during the war, notwithstanding the fact that 
the shareholders of the Buffalo are mostly 
German subjects. On January 2, 1914, an- 
other company was created, this time in Berlin, 
and called the " German Provodnik." Now, 
according to the instructions laying down the 
rights of the Board (Par. 24), wares may not be 
delivered on credit to any firm or institution 
for the value of more than 50,000 roubles, and 

37 



38 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

not even to this amount unless the solvency of 
the recipient is beyond question. 

In spite of this clearly marked limitation 
the Board of the Franco-Russian Provodnik, 
which exerted itself with unwonted zest to 
supply the German Provodnik with motor- 
tyres shortly before the war, opened a credit 
of 498,000 roubles in favour of this firm. The 
manager of the warehouses of the Riga pro- 
ducts in New York is a German subject named 
Lindner. The managers in Zurich and Copen- 
hagen are also German subjects. 1 

It is not to be wondered at that countries 
like Italy and Russia, poor in capital and 
industry, fell an easy prey to the ruthless 
German invader, who, with the help of British, 
French, and even Italian and Russian savings, 
suffocated the nascent industries of the re- 
spective nations, killed foreign competition, 
earned large profits, obtained control of the 
country's resources and an intimate knowledge 
of the political secrets of their respective 
Governments. " Many Germans," wrote an 
Italian Review, 2 " serving in Italian establish- 
ments are in possession of lists of the fortresses, 
measurements, distances, positions of the roads 
and footpaths, they have found the points of 
triangulation and acquired all requisite data 
and information about them. And to-morrow, 
should war break out, they will accompany and 
guide the German or Austrian invaders." 

How keen they are to make themselves con- 
versant with matters of political moment in the 
guise of honest workmen is becoming fairly 
well known to day, although it may be taken 

1 Their names are Johann Assman and Rudolf Meyer. 
Cf. Novoye Vremya, 11/24 August, 1915. 

2 Rassegna Contemporanea. 



THE ANNEXATION MANIA 39 

for granted that if peace were concluded to- 
morrow these same commercial spies would 
find hospitality among some of the easy-going 
merchants of Great Britain, who still refuse 
to believe in the obvious danger or to act upon 
their belief. In November 1912 the Italian 
Minister of the Marine called for tenders for 
the supply of silver dinner-plate for the war- 
ships. At the critical moment, when the 
decision was about to be taken, the German 
firm of Hermann, which has its headquarters 
in Vienna, reduced its offer first by 18 per cent., 
then by 20, and finally by 20*13 per cent, in 
order to get the order. For the order carried 
with it, for the representative of the firm, 
Herr Forster, the permanent right of access to all 
naval arsenals of Italy. 1 

The naivete of Italy in matters of this 
delicate nature stands out in jarring contrast 
to the habitual caution of that diplomatic 
nation, and has not yet been satisfactorily ex- 
plained from the psychological point of view. 
One is puzzled to understand how, months 
after the present war had begun, the press 
of Genoa could announce that the supply of 
electric motors for the Italian marine and of 
ventilators for Italy's fortified places on her 
eastern frontier had been adjudicated to two 
German firms, on the ground that their tenders 
were the lowest. 2 

One of the largest automobile and motor 
works in the German Empire is the Benz and 
Rheinische Automobil und Motoren Fabrik 
Actien Gesellschaft of Mannheim. It supplies 
the Kaiser with his cars and has branches 
everywhere. In Italy, too, it exists and 

1 Ulnvasione tedesca in Italia, p. 171. 

2 Op. cz*., p. 171. 



-40 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

flourishes. But there the great German firm 
is modestly disguised under the name of the 
Societa Italiana Benz. And it is so modest 
that in spite of its gorgeous warehouse in the 
Via Floria (Rome), of its luxurious head-office 
in the Via Finanze, of its well-equipped work- 
shop for repairing and fitting and its little 
army of agents actively pushing the business 
all over Italy, its capital, all told, amounts 
only to 30,000 lire, or £1,000 ! The firm is 
managed by a German engineer whose kith 
and kin are fighting in the Kaiser's army. 
And this German engineer, Herr Matt, has 
free access to the Italian War Minister, even 
now, 1 when it is question of manufacturing 
projectiles ; and he has continuous relations 
with the Italian Airmen's Brigade. 

Electricity in Italy, together with all its 
auxiliary trades and industries, was, like every 
other lucrative enterprise, in the hands of 
Germans and German Swiss. The names of 
the various company directors had the usual 
familiar Teuton sound. When the European 
conflict broke out it seemed for a moment as 
if all these German concerns must come to a 
sudden and dire end. But just as the German 
engineer Herr Matt, whose relatives are officers 
in the Kaiser's army, has free access to the 
Italian War Minister and carries on his business 
in Italy as usual, so the electrical concerns 
had merely to change one or two adjectives in 
their trading names and were forthwith shielded 
from harm. A case in point which is valuable 
because typical occurred recently. The Italian 
Electro-technical Association published a list 
of the manufacturers of electric machines and 

1 Cf . Idea Nazionale. The words " even now " refer to 
November 22, 1915, and may be equally true to-day. 



THE ANNEXATION MANIA 41 

requisites in Italy, and by way of introduction 
set down the following patriotic remarks : 
" This list is addressed to those who at the 
present moment feel it to be their duty to 
uphold and encourage the production and 
development of materials for electricity. Im- 
portation from abroad, which we favoured when 
Italian industry was still in an embryonic stage, 
degenerated especially in consequence of the action 
of the Germans, into a veritable conquest of 
the markets ; and no weapon, licit or illicit, was 
spurned to destroy our sources of production, 
and suffocate our nascent initiative." 

These are pathetic words. They are cal- 
culated to appeal with force to the Italian who 
loves his country. But when one looks more 
closely into the list of Italian producers one is 
disappointed to find the same familiar names as 
before : 1 Allgemeine Electricitats Gesellschaft, 
Thomson Houston, the Mannesmann Tubes 
Co., the Italian Brown Boveri Co., etc. The 
nationalist Italian press organ which first 
directed public attention to these German 
subtleties asks pertinently : " Were not and 
are not the real producers named in this list 
the same who were the prime movers in the 
deplorable foreign conquest of the Italian 
market ? " 2 

The Banca Commerciale, which was ad- 
mittedly an all-powerful German institution, 
and has the control, direct or indirect, of most 
of the industries, the silk manufacture, metal- 
lurgical and mechanical works of the country 
and of thirty-four electrical companies in Italy : 
which possess a capital of 434,000,000 francs 

1 Felix Deutsch, Karl Zander, Otto Joel, Karl von 
Siemens, Walter Boveri, Karl Kapp, etc. 

2 Uldea Nazionale, September 8, 1915. 



42 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

and produce energy equal to 940,000 h.p. : 
found itself in an unpleasant predicament as 
soon as the King of Italy declared war against 
Austria-Hungary. But Teuton resourceful- 
ness solved the problem with ease and seem- 
ing thoroughness by inducing certain German 
officials on the board to resign and appointing 
as Italian director a gentleman known for his 
philo-Germanism. But the three creators of 
the bank were left : Herrn Joel, Toeplitz and 
Weil, and although it was affirmed solemnly 
that Joel was no longer the director but 
M. Fenoglio, it has been publicly proved that 
after the resignation of the former, the latter, 
before sending a consignment of gold to Berlin, 1 
had to ask for and actually received the 
authorization of Herr Joel. 2 

The following brief summary of the com- 
panies and enterprises in which the Banca 
Commerciale is interested may enable the 
British reader to form an idea of its decisive 
influence on the economic and political life 
of the Italian nation : they include eighteen 
of the largest companies of textile industries; 
sixteen of the most important companies of 
chemical, electrical and kindred industries; 
six of the chief companies of alimentation; 
twenty-six transport companies ; twenty-seven 
of the principal companies of mechanical 
industries and naval construction ; six building 
companies ; five of the chief mining companies ; 
twenty-eight of the largest electrical companies ; 
and twenty-two miscellaneous. 3 

Thus every artery and vein of the economic 
organism of Italy is swathed and pressed and 

1 On May 21, 1915. 

2 Video, Nazionale, November 8, 1915. 

3 Giornale d' Italia, November 17, 1915. 



THE ANNEXATION MANIA 48 

choked by this German isolator, which nobody 
dares to pull away. For if we turn from the 
economic to the political aspect of this curious 
phenomenon, we shall find that the companies 
enumerated give work to scores of thousands 
of operators and employees, through whose 
willing instrumentality they become vast elec- 
toral agencies. "It is obvious," we are au- 
thoritatively assured, "that the influence of 
such companies in administrative and political 
elections is put forth in congruity with the 
interests at stake, a circumstance which ex- 
plains how it comes that many Italian politi- 
cians and representatives are, directly or other- 
wise, chained to the chariot of the Banca 
Commerciale and indirectly to that of Ger- 
many's policy." 1 In Italy the deputies are, with 
few exceptions, the humble servants of their 
constituents, and are powerless to shake them- 
selves free from local influences. "It is easy 
to infer from this what efforts have to be made 
and what compromises must be acquiesced in by 
those deputies whose election depends on such 
institutions which, aware that money is more 
than ever the nerve of political contests, subscribe 
to the election expenses, and assure in this way 
the respectful gratitude of the parliamentary 
recipients of their benefactions. And all this is 
executed with order and discipline. Examples 
could be quoted and names mentioned." 2 

The unsuspected ways in which this remark- 
able organization destroys, constructs and draws 
its sustenance from its victims are a revelation. 
Imagine a few British bankers possessed of two 
hundred thousand pounds and conceiving the 

1 Cf. Preziosi, La Germania a la Conquista delV Italia, 
p. 66. 

8 Ibid., p. 67. 



44 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

plan of wresting the economic markets of Italy 
from Britain's rivals, building up an all-power- 
ful organization with Italian money, throttling 
Italian industries and commerce with the help 
of Italian agents paid for the purpose out of 
the hard-earned savings of the Italian people, 
and then yoking the national policy to the 
interests of Great Britain. One would laugh 
to scorn such a mad scheme, and set down its 
authors as wild visionaries. Yet that was the 
programme of the little band of audacious 
Germans who conceived the design of teuton- 
izing Italy. And they had almost realized it 
when the war broke out. Even the halfpence 
scraped together by poor emigrants and half- 
starved Sicilian working-men were diverted from 
the savings banks into banks of German origin, 
two of which held four hundred million francs 
of the nation's economies a few months ago. 

It was not to be expected that the domain 
of foreign politics should long escape the notice 
or be spared the experiments of this all-absorb- 
ing organization. What excites our wonder 
are the superiority of its method and the com- 
pleteness of its success. To the thinking of 
Germany's leaders international politics and 
foreign trade are correlates. In the Near 
East, where so many of Italy's interests are 
now concentrated, the Societa Commerciale 
d'Oriente of Constantinople, being one of the 
agencies of the Banca Commerciale, was also 
one of the canals through which this influence 
passed. Under the Italian flag and with the 
co-operation of Italian diplomacy, that " little 
business " of Germany was conscientiously 
transacted which consisted in the adaptation 
and employment of Italian expansion as an 
instrument for Teutonic interpenetration. 



THE ANNEXATION MANIA 45 

Whithersoever we turn our gaze we discern, 
lurking under the comely vesture of Italy, 
the clumsy form of the Teuton. It is 
amusing to reflect that the recent railway 
concessions in Asia Minor, for which Italian 
statesmen laboured so hard and so long, 
went in reality to the Banca Commerciale, 
which is but a roundabout way of saying 
to Germany. And in order to win their 
suit and have those advantages conferred on 
" Italy," King Victor's Government agreed to 
renounce their claims for the reimbursement 
of the expenses incurred during the administra- 
tion of the occupied Turkish islands. This 
sacrifice meant tens of millions of francs, kept 
from the pockets of Italian taxpayers and handed 
over to the German bankers, who spent them in 
promoting anti-Italian projects. The Bank of 
Albania was also conceived originally as an organ 
of German propaganda, and was pushed forward 
by the same set of agents who induced the 
Italian Government to employ them as its 
own. 

In those ways the seemingly modest little 
bank scheme which Friedrich Weil with Crispi's 
help initiated in 1890, grew until it acquired 
the influence of a State within the State. And 
then it began to discharge functions unique 
in the history of the banking world. Its 
employees became diplomatists and statesmen 
at a moment's notice, ended wars, and drafted 
treaties. The Banca Commerciale put a stop 
to the campaign against Turkey which was a 
thorn in the side of Teutonism and settled the 
terms of peace in accordance with its own 
judgment. It was not an ambassador or a 
minister who opened the pourparlers in Stam- 
boul and continued them at Ouchy, but an 



46 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

agent of the Banca Commerciale. It was 
that same agent who immediately afterwards, 
in concert with colleagues of his bank, nego- 
tiated the treaty, reporting by telegraph to 
the headquarters of the bank in Milan every 
important conversation he had with the 
Turkish delegates. 1 At a later date important 
conversations between the British Foreign 
Office and the Consulta were entered into in 
the name and for the alleged interests of Italy, 
but the principal part in the drawing up of the 
terms of the settlement arrived at was taken 
by Signor Nogara of the Societa Commerciale 
d'Oriente, — the company which the concessions 
demanded were destined to benefit. In fine, 
the parasite had thus become almost equal in 
power to the body on which it battened. 

A well-known politician and member of the 
Italian Legislature, Di Cesaro, narrated the 
following curious incident in a public speech 
delivered on March 17, 1915: "An Italian 
Admiral, having had the audacity to request 
the immediate delivery of an order for arms 
manufactured by the works which are under the 
control of the Banca Commerciale, was relieved 
of his functions within twenty-four hours, and 
his place was taken by another Admiral, who 
by chance happened to be the brother of one 
of the negotiators of the Italo-Turkish Peace 
of Ouchy." And as we saw, the negotiators 
of that peace were officials of the Banca 
Commerciale. An authority on the subject 2 
wrote : " For many years the Banca Com- 
merciale has contrived, directly or indirectly, 
according to circumstances, to take a hand 

1 Signor Preziosi gives the names of those agents as 
MM. Volpi, Bertolini and Nogara (op. cit., p. 71). 

2 Professor Bondi, ex-Questor of Milan. 



THE ANNEXATION MANIA 47 

in the formation of various ministries. ... As 
a matter of fact, on its governing board there 
are seven senators, many deputies, and a 
numerous host of political notabilities. It has 
its tentacles' everywhere, high up and low 
down, in Italy and abroad, in peace time and 
in war time, when our native land is elated 
with good fortune and when it is cast down 
with bad. Its hand lies heavy upon every- 
thing and everybody. It is the arbitress in 
the choice of good and evil and is under no 
obligation to render an account of its doings 
to any one. ... In war time we are certain 
to feel greatly hampered by the meshes of 
such a firmly woven net." x This anticipation 
has since come true. 

Like the vampire that soothes its victim 
while drawing its life-blood, the parasitic 
German organism cast a spell over influential 
Italians of the community and imparted to 
them a feeling that things were going well with 
themselves and their country. Money passed 
from hand to hand. Labour found remunera- 
tive employment. Towns in decay were galvan- 
ized into new life. And all Italy was grateful. 
Milan, the " moral capital " of the kingdom, 
where a couple of decades before the name 
of Germany was execrated, became itself very 
largely Teutonic and was dominated by a rich 
and flourishing German colony. Venice, Genoa, 
Rome, Florence, Naples, Palermo and Torino, 
leavened in the same plentiful degree with 
pushing subjects of the Kaiser, turned towards 
Berlin as the sunflower towards the orb of day. 

Against Austria, Italians might write and 

1 Rivelazioni postume alle Memorie di un questore, 
1913. Cf. Preziosi, La Germania a la Conquista delV 
Italia, p. 75 ff. 



48 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

talk to their hearts' content, but towards 
Germany feelings of respect verging on awe 
and of gratitude bordering on genuine friend- 
ship were cherished by every institution and 
leading individual in the kingdom. And when 
the hour struck to wrench Italy from that 
monster vampire, the task was so arduous 
and fraught with such danger that no Cabinet 
without the insistent encouragement of the 
whole nation would have attempted it. The 
policy of every Foreign Secretary was and still 
is dominated by this unnatural relationship to 
the Teuton, and it came at last to be acknow- 
ledged as a political dogma that Germany must 
in no case be confounded with Austria. In- 
deed, it is fair to assert that the governing 
circles of both countries held and hold that 
nothing should be allowed to mar these 
friendly feelings, not even the circumstance 
that Germany as Austria's ally is bound to 
stand by her during the war. Hence when 
the friction between Italy and Austria was 
growing dangerous, Germany was ready with 
two expedients for keeping her friendly inter- 
course with the former country intact. She 
first assumed the role of umpire between them, 
endeavouring to beat down the demands of 
the one while spurring on the other to a 
higher degree of liberality, and when her 
well-laid and skilfully executed plan unex- 
pectedly failed, in consequence of the inter- 
position of a deus ex machina, she produced 
a draft treaty, complete in all details, which 
was to rob war between Italy and herself, if 
circumstances should render it unavoidable, 
of all its frightfulness and savagery. The 
two nations virtually said to one another : 
" Whatever else we may do, we shall steer 



THE ANNEXATION MANIA 49 

clear of mutual hostilities to the best of our 
ability. But as the action and reaction of 
alliances may thwart our efforts and force 
us into war against each other, we hereby 
undertake that that war shall be but a 
simulacrum of the struggle that we are at 
present waging against all our other adver- 
saries. We shall respect each other's property 
religiously, for we shall both stand in need of 
each other when the exhausting struggle is 
ended and the wounds it inflicted have to be 
dressed and healed. We Germans have in- 
vested thousands of millions of francs in Italy, 
the one foreign country for which we feel 
genuine affection. You Italians have thriven 
on our commercial and industrial enterprise. 
Spare our property now and you shall not 
rue your self-containment. After the war 
the Entente people will shun us as lepers, and 
our only hope of finding outlets for our com- 
merce is through the neutral States. Now, 
of all the European Great Powers, Italy is 
the only one qualified to render us great 
services of this nature. And she will be glad 
of a partner whose help is free from the alloy 
of jealousy or hostility. For our interests do 
not clash, whereas those of Italy and the 
Entente Powers never can run parallel. In 
the Adriatic she will find the Slavs pitted 
against her, in Asia Minor the Russians, 
French, British, Greeks, and in the Eastern 
Mediterranean the three last-named States. 
But at no point does Germany cross her path. 
Our common hope in the future is based on 
our experience of the past. It is knowledge 
rather than trust. We Germans succeeded 
in laying the foundations of your economic 
strength. And now that Austria's rivalry 



50 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

has ceased, we will contribute to your political 
growth. With the help of our organizing 
talent you will become the France of the 
future. Your population is already well-nigh 
equal to that of the Republic. In ten years 
it will be more numerous, and will still go on 
increasing. Tunis has been built up by 
Italian toil. Nature has assigned the Mediter- 
ranean to Italy as her natural domain. The 
overlordship of the Midland Sea is yours by 
right, and in co-partnership with us you shall 
assert and enforce this right. Mind your 
steps, therefore, in performing the difficult 
egg dance which the European War may 
impose on us both. You are not, cannot be, 
friends of France, closely though you are 
related by blood. Neither can the French 
become our friends. Therefore you and we 
are natural allies, as your far-sighted poli- 
ticians like Crispi perceived. Even Sonnino 
sees that and acknowledges it. The one 
political idea of his life was to solder Italy 
firmly to Germany. And that is still the 
desire of your aristocracy. Fight with Aus- 
tria, if you must, but Italy and Germany 
must not become armed enemies." 

Nearly two milliards of francs of German 
money are invested in commercial and indus- 
trial enterprises and immovable property in 
Italy, besides the value of ships detained at 
Italian ports, some of which have cargoes 
valued at several million francs. The Kaiser 
is himself the largest shareholder in the 
Italian mercury mines of Monte Amiata, his 
Foreign Secretary, von Jagow, is another. 
And they are resolved not to relinquish their 
hold. That Prince von Buelow should move 
every lever to save this precious pledge was 



THE ANNEXATION MANIA 51 

natural, and that Italian statesmen with their 
germanophile leanings should readily fall in 
with his scheme is not to be wondered at. 
The Kaiser's ambassador proposed that in 
the case of war each contracting party should 
respect the property of the other. This 
formula sounds decorous. Its meaning is 
profound. A treaty embodying these stipula- 
tions was agreed to and secretly signed by 
Prince von Buelow and Baron Sidney 
Sonnino, whose admiration for Germany em- 
bodied itself in all the more important acts 
of his political career. This transaction, 
which the Italian Government wisely re- 
frained from publishing, was announced by 
the Germans for reasons of their own. The 
impression produced by this display of eclectic 
affinities so pronounced that even the world's 
most ruthless war could not impair them was 
considerable. And it would have been 
heightened if the alleged and credible fact had 
also been divulged that the diplomatic instru- 
ment was ratified when Italy had already decided 
upon war with Austria-Hungary. Between 
Italy and Germany stands a bridge which both 
peoples are resolved to keep intact at all costs. 
Against the facts it is useless to argue. 

The struggle between Germany and Italy, 
therefore, should it ever break out, would 
differ not merely in degree, but also, one 
may take it, in kind, from the lawless and 
ruthless savagery which characterizes the 
warfare of the Teutons against the Entente 
Powers. A civilizing mute would deaden the 
resonance of bestial passion ; and even private 
property — in especial that of Germany — 
would be safe from confiscation and wanton 
destruction, and when peace is restored the 



52 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

rich mercury mines of Italy will again belong 
to the Kaiser and his advisers. Last summer x 
a series of private meetings was held for three 
days running in Switzerland, at which Ger- 
mans of high standing took part, for the 
purpose of dealing with German capital in 
Italy and safeguarding it during the war. At 
one of the sittings it was computed that about 
two milliards of francs belonging to German 
subjects are buried in Italian undertakings or 
in house or landed property. 

In November 1915 the Italian Government 
publicly applied one of the provisions of the 
secret treaty in favour of Germany. At that 
moment it was deemed necessary to com- 
mandeer German ships in Italian ports for 
the service of the navy and the mercantile 
marine. Had it been a question of Austrian 
vessels they would have been seized and 
utilized without any such precautions. In 
virtue of § 4 of the Treaty the Italian authori- 
ties undertook to pay a monthly sum to the 
German owners for the use of their steamers. 
That clause lays it down that the two con- 
tracting states shall respect the enactment 
made by the concluding section of Article VI 
of the Hague Convention concerning the 
treatment of enemy merchant vessels. 

This treaty, then, is no mere scrap of 
paper. It is a strong bridge spanning the 
chasm between Italo-German friendship in 
the past and Italo-German friendship after 
the war. To take due note of this and of 
like symptoms of the coming readjustment 
of political and economic forces is one of the 
primary duties of Entente statesmanship which 
one piously hopes are being efficiently discharged. 

1 1915. 



CHAPTER V 

GERMANY AND RUSSIA 

Turning to our other ally, Russia, we find 
that she underwent a course of treatment 
similar to that which well-nigh prussianized 
Italy. In the Tsardom the task was especially 
easy owing largely to the advantages offered to 
Teutonic immigrants from the days of yore, 
to the German-speaking inhabitants of the 
Baltic provinces, to the proselytizing German 
schools which flourish in Petrograd, Moscow, 
Odessa, Kieff, Saratoff, Simbirsk, Tiflis, War- 
saw and other centres, to German colonies 
scattered over Russia and to religious sects. 
During the Manchurian campaign the Com- 
mercial Treaty drafted in Berlin, and at first 
denounced by Count Witte as ruinous to 
his country, was agreed to and signed. 1 It 
was Hobson's choice. After that the empire, 
which had already been a favourite and 
fruitful field for Germany's experiments, be- 
came one of the most copious sources of 
her national prosperity. Commercial push 
and political espionage were so thoroughly 
fused that no line of demarcation remained 
visible. 

Russia's losses were proportionate and at 
the time were computed at 35,000,000 marks a 
year. In the Tsardom the imposition of this 
tribute was resented. By the Teutons their 

1 In June 1904. 
53 



54 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

economic victory was followed by political 
influence. Their agents and spies abounded 
everywhere. Time passed, and as relations 
between the two empires grew tenser, the 
danger defined itself in sharper outline to 
the eyes of Russian statesmen, who resolved, 
however, to postpone remedial measures until 
the day should come for the discussion of 
the renewal of the Commercial Treaty. The 
knowledge that Russia would refuse either to 
prolong that one-sided arrangement or to make 
another like it, and that the consequences of 
this refusal would be disastrous to Germany's 
economic and financial position, stimulated 
German statesmen to bring matters to a head 
before Russia could back her recalcitrance 
with a reorganized army, and was one of 
the contributory causes of the European 
struggle. 

Since then the war has flashed a brilliant 
light on the dark places of German intrigue, 
and some of the sights revealed are hardly 
credible. Whithersoever one turns one is con- 
fronted with the same striking phenomenon; 
the preponderant influence wielded in almost 
every walk of life, private and public, by 
institutions and individuals who in some 
open or clandestine way are under German 
tutelage. In the sphere of economics this is 
particularly noticeable. Three-fourths of 
Russia's foreign trade was in German hands. 
Dealings between Russians and foreigners 
were transacted chiefly through Germany. 
Imports and exports passed principally through 
German offices, established throughout the 
length and breadth of the Tsardom, and com- 
mercial dealings were conducted by merchants 
in Berlin, Hamburg, Konigsberg, Leipzig, and 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 55 

other centres of the Fatherland. Merchandise 
was carried in and out of the country by 
German railway lines, or to German ports in 
German bottoms. Even American cotton and 
Australian wool and tallow were disposed of 
in Russia by German middlemen who had 
them conveyed in German steamers. On the 
other hand, Russian corn, sugar, spirits, were 
taken to Europe by German transport firms. 
Intending Russian emigrants were sought out 
by agents of German steamship companies, 
sent to German ports and accommodated on 
German steamers. In brief, whenever the 
Tsar's subjects had anything to sell to the 
foreigner or to buy from him, their first step 
was to go in search of a German, through 
whom the sale or purchase might be effected. 
In domestic economics the same phenomenon 
was everywhere noticeable. To a Russian's 
success in almost any commercial or industrial 
venture, the co-operation of the German was 
an indispensable condition. Individual enter- 
prise might sow and governmental legisla- 
tion might water, but it was German goodwill 
that vouchsafed the fruit. Wherever Russian 
industry showed its head, Germans flocked 
thither to take the concern in hand, regulate 
its growth, and co-ordinate its effects with 
those of other industries which were under the 
patronage of German banks. It was in vain 
that Witte and his fellow workers threw up 
barriers that seemed impassable to German 
enterprise. They were turned with ease and 
rapidity. Thus in order to protect the textile 
industries of Moscow, prohibitive tariffs were 
levied on textile fabrics of German origin. 
But the irrepressible Teuton crossed the fron- 
tier, established his factories in Poland, founded 



56 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

the German- Jewish town of Lodz, and snapped 
his fingers at the Government of the Tsar. 
And forthwith Lodz assumed all the charac- 
teristics of a German city. German schools 
flourished there, German agents abounded, 
German became the recognized language, and 
permission was at one time given to German 
reserves there, to undergo their periodic term 
of military drill for the Kaiser's army ! 

Of the three Entente Powers challenged by 
Germany in 1914, Russia was therefore by far 
the worst equipped for the unwonted effort 
which the European War demanded of each. 
For her liberty of action, and, in some cases, 
even her liberty of choice, was hampered by 
the financial, economic, and political network 
which Germany had slowly and almost im- 
perceptibly woven over the entire population. 
In the fine meshes of this net several organs 
of national life were caught, immobilized and 
connected with the Fatherland. And it was 
not until they strove to move and discharge 
their functions on behalf of the Russian nation 
that they became fully conscious of their 
plight. German intrigue and subterranean 
scheming, under the mask of sympathy — now 
for the autocracy, now for socialism — had 
effected far-reaching changes in the Empire, 
which few even among observant politicians 
appear to have realized. These innovations 
were embodied in the thraldom of Russian 
banks to German financial institutions; in 
the splendid organization which kept old 
German colonies that were scattered over the 
Empire in touch with each other, and co- 
ordinated their action ; in the eloquent Russian 
advocates and influential dignitaries who con- 
tributed to the furtherance of German ideas 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 57 

and interests and swayed the policy of the 
State; and in the dependence of the great 
Russian Empire on its enemy for munitions, 
and almost every other technical necessary 
of war. 

From the days of the great Peter this 
Teuton influence had been creeping imper- 
ceptibly over the Slav race like some cancerous 
soul-growth. It infused a subtle poison in 
the State organism, the most appalling effects 
of which are only now assuming visible shape. 
Two palace revolutions were brought about 
by a national reaction against the predominance 
of this foreign influence, which was resented 
by the people not merely because it was alien, 
but largely also because of its unscrupulous 
and ruthless character. Some of the most 
atrocious cruelties which students of Russian 
history associate with court and political life 
in the Tsardom, during the best part of two 
centuries, had their sources in the sheer 
malignity of Teuton Ministers who spoke and 
acted in the name of the autocrat of the 
moment. It is characteristic that the Minister 
Munnich, in the school for officers which he 
founded in Petersburg, had Russian history 
eliminated from the programme as superfluous, 
German history being allowed to remain; and 
that out of 255 students, only eighteen studied 
the Russian language, whereas 237 applied 
themselves to German. The first Sovereign 
to rebel against this Teuton supremacy in his 
Empire was the late Alexander III., who made 
no secret of his profound dislike for German 
ways. But as the Russian proverb has it, 
" one man in the field, is not a soldier." 
Hercules, to cleanse the Augean stables, had 
need of the water of a river, and the anti- 



58 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

German Tsar could not hope to make headway 
without the co-operation of his army of 
officials, who themselves were permeated with 
the Teutonic spirit. And as passive resistance 
was their attitude, his purging scheme was 
abortive. As a matter of cool calculation, 
the only hope of freeing Russia from the 
meshes of the German net was a war between 
the two peoples. And all radical legislation 
had therefore to be postponed. 

In the meanwhile the Germans, having 
organized and primed their agents, have been 
teutonizing Russia cunningly and effectively. 
With the precious assistance of their own kith 
and kin settled in the Baltic provinces and 
elsewhere, they employed the never-failing 
expedient of taking an active and, when 
possible, a leading part in domestic Russian 
politics, and invariably on both sides. At 
the Court they have always been well repre- 
sented, and in the ranks of the inarticulate 
and Parliamentary Opposition they have also 
been playing a noteworthy part. In factories 
and other industrial and commercial institu- 
tions they arranged strikes, called indignation 
meetings and hatched conspiracies at critical 
junctures when it was to Germany's interest 
that Russia's attention should be riveted 
upon home affairs. No Parliamentary Bill 
could be privately drafted, no railway scheme 
could be secretly discussed, no Ministerial 
measure could be canvassed; nay, seldom 
could a confidential report be drawn up to the 
Emperor himself without the knowledge of 
the Berlin authorities and the occasional inter- 
vention of their agents in Petrograd. It is 
interesting to note that in 1914 a secret 
memorandum of a higly confidential character, 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 59 

from a statesman to the Tsar, found its way 
to Berlin soon after it had been presented to 
the monarch and had a certain influence on 
the decisions which led to the war. 

The work of economic interpenetration 
carried on under the aegis of such powerful 
patrons and resourceful coadjutors was greatly 
facilitated by the German colonies scattered 
over Russia for generations. Many of these 
foreigners had been invited by Catherine II., 
receiving large grants of land and various 
privileges which enabled them to nourish at 
the expense of the native population, on which 
they looked down with open contempt. 

At that time the extent of free land was 
considerable in Bessarabia, Volhynia, and the 
provinces of Kherson, Ekaterinoslav, Saratoff 
and Samara, where down to the year 1915 
entire cantons were inhabited by Germans. 
In the Novouzensky canton, for example, they 
constituted 40 per cent, of the population, 
in that of Berdyansk 17 per cent, and in the 
Akkerman canton 14 per cent. The induce- 
ments which had been held out to them to 
settle in these fertile districts were irresistible. 
Each colonist received fifty dessiatines of 
land, 1 extensive pastures for cattle, grants 
for the journey and the cost of stocking 
his farm, absolute immunity from all taxes, 
rates and military service, and complete local 
autonomy apart from that of the Russian 
community. 

The Germans whom these boons attracted 
were of two categories : sectarians (Menonites), 
who eschewed military service on religious 
grounds; and ne'er-do-weels, who objected 
to the restraints of law and justice in the 
1 About 107 acres. 



60 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Fatherland; besides a considerable percentage 
of tramps. Most of the men of the second 
category fared as badly in their adopted 
country as they had in their native land. 
They gave themselves up to intemperance and 
kindred vices, and their descendants still lead 
a hand-to-mouth existence in the Tsardom 
which their privileges alone could not better. 
The sectarians, on the other hand, formed a 
compact co-operative body, and by dint of 
persevering industry and shrewdness, made 
the most of their favoured position and pros- 
pered. With their common savings they 
purchased such vast tracts of land from the 
neighbouring gentry that in time the Russian 
population was constrained to emigrate to 
Siberia and other distant parts of the Empire. 
And when the present conflict was unchained 
they were in possession of an area of fertile 
land bigger than Pomerania, which is one of 
the largest provinces of Prussia. In the Volga 
country alone they owned 879,420 dessiatines, 
or, say, 1,884,471 acres ! In the south of 
Russia there are 519 German settlements, and 
the area they occupy is estimated at more 
than 31,252 square versts. 1 And the land 
of the country gentry in the neighbouring 
districts was fast passing into their hands. 2 
They have their own local government, their 
banks which help them to acquire Russian 
land, their insurance companies and their 
schools. In short, they were a compact little 
State within the Tsardom. 

The sectarians still hold aloof from the 
native population. Indeed, almost the only 
relations in which they stand to Russians are 

1 One square verst is equal to 0*44 square mile. 

2 Cf. Novoye Vremya, October 5, 1914. 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 61 

those of masters and agricultural labourers. 
They hire Russian peasants to till their land 
and they compel them to work hard for small 
wages. Many of these colonies have the ap- 
pearance of little German towns. They have 
added industrial pursuits to agricultural, pos- 
sess flour mills, timber mills, and plough their 
farms with German implements. They are 
aggressively German in sentiment, language, 
character and Kultur. 

That in brief is the history of one type of 
German colonization in the Tsardom. There 
is another at which it may not be amiss to 
cast a glance. It is of recent date and consists 
of German elements already resident in the 
Tsardom. It is a monument of Teuton 
audacity and Slav forbearance. One might 
ransack the history of European nations with- 
out finding another such instance of downright 
effrontery and disloyalty on the part of a 
privileged section of the community, and of 
easy-going toleration on the part of the State. 
The German elements of the provinces of 
Kurland and Li viand, subjects of the Tsar 
though they are, resolved after the abortive 
revolution of 1906 to raise a living wall against 
the rising tide of Russian influence. And as 
is the wont of the Teuton throughout the world, 
they employed Russia's men and Russia's 
money to achieve their anti-Russian object. 
This object was to attract some twenty 
thousand Germans to the province, provide 
them with farms on easy terms, and look to 
time, the industry of the men, the fecundity 
of the women and the teachings of the schools 
to create a new German State in that part 
of the Russian Empire. It was part of the 
functions of these colonists, we are frankly 



62 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

told by their historiographer, 1 " to serve, even 
as armed defenders " against the Russians ! 
In no other country on the globe is such a 
scheme conceivable. 

The undertaking was organized and carried 
out by two brothers, Brodrich by name, in 
one of whom the Tsar's Government placed 
implicit confidence and evinced it by appointing 
him to be chief of the police in the canton of 
Goldingen. In this post of trust the German 
leader was able to further the anti-Russian 
cause materially. And he utilized his oppor- 
tunities to the utmost for the purpose during 
the five years of his tenure of office. He 
himself travelled in search of suitable German 
colonists and had numerous agents on the 
look-out for such. He finally got about 13,000 
to settle in Kurland and 7000 in Livland. 
The Kurlandische Kreditverein advanced the 
necessary capital as mortgagee of the land, 
and within five or six years many of the 
colonists had already paid off their debts, 
sold their farms to other Germans and bought 
untilled land in the neighbourhood for them- 
selves. The school was responsible for the 
required standard of German patriotism. The 
success of the experiment exceeded the highest 
expectations, and to-day the man of confidence 
of the Tsar's Government, Karl Robert 
Brodrich, is become chief of the local adminis- 
tration under Wilhelm II., and deservedly 
enjoys the confidence of the Kaiser's Ministers. 

This type of German invasion in Russia, 
especially in recent years, was carried out 

1 His name is Dr. Fritz Wertheimer. His writings are 
to be found in various periodicals. The essay from which 
these data are taken was published in the Frankfurt 
Zeitung, January 8, 1916. 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 63 

with a supreme disdain of the laws of the 
Empire which is equally characteristic of 
those who display and those who tolerate it. 
In virtue of a law inscribed in the Statute 
Book on 14/26 March 1887, foreigners are not 
permitted to purchase or own land outside 
the cities in the provinces of Kurland and Liv- 
land, whereas in Esthland there is no such 
prohibition. Yet in Esthland only 6396 des- 
siatines belong to Germans, whereas in the 
two provinces whence they are absolutely 
excluded Germans possess 36,852 dessiatines 
and 6396 dessiatines respectively ! In the 
territory of the Don Cossacks no foreigner 
may possess land under any circumstance, 
yet the Germans own there 3700 dessiatines. 
Again, in the provinces of Podolia and Volhynia, 
where, for State reasons, the ownership of 
land is allowed only to Russians, Germans pur- 
chased and own 63,831 dessiatines in the latter 
province and 12,475 in the former. Altogether 
the amount of Russian territory which passed 
into the hands of the Teutons is enormous. 
In July 1915, when the inventory was not yet 
completed, the area inscribed had reached the 
total of 2,450,000 dessiatines or about 5,250,000 
acres. 1 " This figure — " we are assured — " is still 
far from complete, inasmuch as a large number 
of data from various provinces have not been in- 
cluded in it, and there are no entries at all for the 
three provinces of the kingdom of Poland where 
military operations are going on and where 
unhappily the presence of German colonists has 
been utilized by the German General Staff." 2 

1 Novoye Vremya, July 2, 1915. 

2 By a law sanctioned by the Tsar, in February 1915, 
the German Colonists of Southern and Western Russia 
were obliged to sell their land to Russian subjects, and 
they received ten months' grace for the purpose. 



64 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

In Poland there were well over 500,000 
German colonists, besides a large number of 
new-comers, whose unwritten " privileges " 
included, as we saw, occasional permission 
to their young men liable to serve a few weeks 
annually in the ranks of the German army 
to discharge that duty under German officers 
in Russian Poland ! In the Ukraine and the 
most fertile districts of the Volga basin hun- 
dreds of thousands of Germans lived, throve, 
and upheld the traditions as well as the 
language of the Fatherland, under the eyes 
of tolerant local authorities. 

Hard by old Novgorod, the once famous 
Russian republic and cradle of the Russian 
State, a number of German colonists settled 
some 150 years ago. The population of two 
of these settlements numbers several thousand 
souls, descendants of the original settlers, in 
the fourth and fifth generation. They had 
had time enough, one would think, during 
that century-and-a-half to assimilate Russian 
ways and to acquire a thorough knowledge of 
the Russian tongue. Well, these colonists do 
not speak the language of the country in 
which they and their forbears have been 
living for over 150 years ! They still consider 
themselves German, and if you ask them who 
their sovereign is they answer unhesitatingly — 
Kaiser Wilhelm ! During Russia's recent 
military reverses, which threatened for a time 
to culminate in the capture of Riga, and 
possibly of Petrograd as well, these parasites 
in the body politic of Russia displayed their 
joy in various unseemly ways, which aroused 
the indignation of their Slav neighbours. In 
one of their schools the Russian visiting 
authorities were received with demonstrations 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 65 

of hostility. It is usual for the portrait of the 
Russian Tsar to be set up in every school in 
the Empire. In one of these educational esta- 
blishments it was discovered in the lavatory 
with the eyes gouged out. 

Long before this war Berlin had become alive 
to the importance of these colonies as factors 
in the work of pacific interpenetration and 
political propaganda. Wandering teachers 
from the Fatherland were accordingly sent 
among them to link them up with their brethren 
at home, and fan the embers of patriotism 
which long residence in the Tsardom had not 
quenched. Little by little, the political fruits 
of these apostolic labours began to show 
themselves : the colonists, whose main pre- 
occupation had been to occupy the most 
fertile soil in the district, began to take over 
the approaches to Russia's strategic plans, 
and to display an absorbing interest in Russian 
politics. Several Zemstvos fell into their 
hands, and were practically controlled by 
them, and they contrived to gain considerable 
influence in the elections to the Duma. 

The chance of a useful part for these German 
colonies to perform having thus unexpectedly 
arisen on the horizon, they seized it with 
promptitude and utilized it with the thorough- 
ness that characterizes their race. The numbers 
prosperity, and influence of the colonies grew 
rapidly. Land that had belonged to the 
Russian peasantry was taken over by the 
foreign parasites, and while the Tsar's Minister, 
were toiling and moiling to transport hundreds 
of thousands of Russian husbandmen and their 
families in search of land beyond the Ural 
Mountains to the virgin forests of Eastern 
Siberia, there in the very heart of European 



66 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Russia were hundreds of thousands of intruders, 
who, with the help of their German Colonial 
banks, were acquiring additional tracts of land 
from which their native owners had been ousted. 
I pointed out this anomaly over and over 
again, and long before the war I described it 
in review articles. The well-known German 
Professor, Hans Delbrtick, replied shortly 
afterwards, in the Contemporary Review, 1 
denying point-blank the truth of my 
statements, which were drawn from official 
sources, and confirmed by the evidence 
of my senses. For I had visited several 
of the colonies in question. Besides these 
German settlements, there had also been 
a number of German industrial and com- 
mercial establishments in the Empire which, 
at first nowise harmful, were afterwards taken 
in hand by emissaries from Berlin, linked up 
together, affiliated to one or other of the great 
financial houses of Germany, and transformed 
into redoubtable instruments of Teuton domi- 
nation. Capital was subscribed, syndicates 
were formed, railway-building and electro- 
technical industries were organized, Russia's 
railways policy modified, and metallurgical 
works were monopolized by the Germans. 
Here again financial institutions discharged 
the functions of motive power. At the begin- 
ning, about thirty million roubles were sub- 
scribed for the creation of banks, and by dint 
of push, importunity, secret influence and 
intrigue, these institutions received on deposit 
the savings of the Russian peasant, merchant, 
landowner, and official, which finally mounted 
up to several hundreds of millions. With 
this money they were enabled to control the 
1 Cf. Contemporary Revieiv, February 1911. 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 67 

markets and constrain Russian institutions 
and individuals to bow to their will. 

Contracts in Russia were appropriately 
drafted in the German language, being directed 
to the promotion of German interests. Incipi- 
ent and even long-established Russian firms 
were either killed by unfair competition or 
compelled to enter the syndicates and forego 
their national character. Inventions and new 
appliances were tested, plagiarized, and em- 
ployed in the service of the Fatherland. And 
while preparing for the war which was to set 
Germany above the nations — Deutschland iiber 
Alles — these syndicates followed the policy 
"'dictated from Berlin, sowed discord between 
Russian firms and various State departments, 
organized strikes and paid the strikers in 
competing establishments, and thus deprived 
the Russian State of industrial organs on 
which it would necessarily have to rely in 
war-time. To give but one example of this 
cleverly devised attack, the cotton industry of 
the Tsardom was in the hands of the Germans 
when war was declared. Another of the most 
important groups of Russian industries is 
that of naphtha. When this precious liquid 
is dear, many of the lesser works have to close ; 
when it is cheap, even small industrial enter- 
prises are able to go on working. By way 
of obtaining complete control of this vital 
element of Russia's industrial life, the Deutsche 
Bank went to work to form a syndicate, had 
a number of private wells bought up, united 
them in one, acquired numerous shares in 
Russian oil companies, and had the manager 
of another German bank — the well-known 
Disconto Gesellschafft — made a member of 
the Board of the Russian Nobel Company. 



68 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

One of the results of this ingenious deal was 
a sharp rise in the prices of all the products 
and some of the by-products of naphtha. 
The increase continued at an alarming rate, 
filling the pockets of the German shareholders, 
whose syndicates received the oil at cost 
price for their own consumption, while Russian 
firms were forced to acquire it at the market 
value or to shut down their works. Amongst 
the worst sufferers from these anti-Russian 
tactics were the steam-navigation companies 
of the Volga, which had jealously warded off 
all attempts to germanize them. 

In conditions as restrictive as these, it is 
well-nigh impossible for Russian industry to 
hold its own, much less prosper and grow. 
And only the most vigorous and best-organized 
enterprises in the Empire, like that of the 
Morozoffs in Moscow, managed to pursue their 
way unscathed. In Russian Poland, where 
textile industries flourished, and the total 
annual production was valued at 294,000,000 
roubles, over one-third of these industries be- 
longed to the Germans, whose yearly output 
amounted to more than one-half of the grand 
total, i. e., to 150,000,000 roubles. 1 In all 
these industrial and commercial campaigns 
the German prime movers had carried out 
their operations more or less openly. But 
where interests affecting the defences of the 
Empire were concerned, caution was the first 
condition of success, and, as usual, the Teutons 
proved supple and adaptable. By way of 
levying an attack against the shipbuilding 
industry, they pushed shaky Russian con- 
cerns into the foreground, while studiously 
keeping themselves out of view. Thus in 
1 Cf . Duma debates of August 1914. 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 69 

one case new Russian banks were founded, 
and old ones in a state of decay were revived 
by means of German capital and encouraged 
to form a syndicate with the Nikolayeffsky 
shipbuilding works and certain foreign banks. 
An official inquiry, presided over by Senator 
Neidhardt, lately revealed the significant fact 
that each firm of this syndicate had bound 
itself to demand identical prices for the con- 
struction of Russian ships, and under no 
circumstances to abate an iota of the demand. 
And it was further agreed that these prices 
should be so calculated as to yield to the members 
of the syndicate one hundred per cent, profit. 

This allegation is not a mere inference, nor 
a rumour. It is an established fact. Neither 
is the proof circumstantial; it consists of the 
original agreement in writing signed by the 
authorized representatives of the institutions 
concerned. The data were laid before the 
members of the Russian Duma by A. N. 
Khvostoff. 1 Thus the Russian peasant is 
taxed for the creation of a fleet, and the Duma 
votes an initial credit of, say, 500,000,000 
roubles for the purpose. And if the ship- 
building companies and their financial bankers 
were honest the aim could be achieved. But 
in the circumstances what it comes to is that 
the nation must pay 500,000,000 more, in 
order to get what it wants. And this tax of 
a hundred per cent, is levied by German para- 
sites on the Russian people. One might 
scrutinize the history of corruption in every 
country of Europe without finding anything 
to beat this Teutonic device, which at the same 
time gratified the cupidity of the money- 
makers and dealt a stunning blow at the 
1 Cf. Novoye Vrcmya, August 17, 1915. 



70 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Russian State. Half of the shares of the 
celebrated Putiloff munitions factory are said 
to have belonged to the Austrian Skoda 
Works. 

At the outset of the present war, when 
Russia's needs were growing greater and more 
pressing, the works controlled by Germans 
and Germany's agents diminished their output 
steadily. In lieu of turning out, say, 30,000 
poods of iron they would produce only 5,000, 
and offer instead of the remainder verbal 
explanations to the effect that lack of fuel or 
damage to the machinery had caused the 
diminution. Again, one of these ubiquitous 
banks buys a large amount of corn or sugar, 
but instead of having it conveyed to the 
districts suffering from a dearth of that com- 
modity, deposits it in a safe place and waits. 
In the meantime prices go up until they reach 
the prohibition level. Then the bank sells its 
stores in small quantities. The people suffer, 
murmur, and blame the Government. Nor is 
it only the average man who thus complains. 
In the Duma the authorities have been severely 
blamed for leaving the population to the mercy 
of those money-grubbers whom German capital 
and Russian tribute are making rich. " Averse 
to go to the root of the matter," one Deputy 
complained, " the Government punishes a 
woman who, on the market sells a herring 
five copecks dearer than the current price, 
yet at the same time it permits the Governors 
to promulgate their own arbitrary laws 
regulating imports and exports from their 
own provinces. In this way Russia is split 
up into sixty different regions, each one of 
which pursues its own policy unchecked." 

The importance of the role played by the 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 



71 



banks financed by German capital in Russia 
can hardly be overstated. They advance money 
on the crops and take railway and steamship 
invoices as guarantees — they are centres of 
information respecting everybody who resides 
and everything that goes on in the district 
and the province. I write with personal 
knowledge of their working, for I watched 
it at close quarters in the Volga district and 
the Caucasus with the assistance of an ex- 
perienced bank manager. Their political 
influence can be far-reaching, and the services 
which they are enabled to render to the 
Fatherland are appreciable. And they ren- 
dered them willingly. As extenders of 
Germany's economic power in the Empire 
they merited uncommonly well of their own 
kindred. Thus of Russia's total imports 
in the year 1910, which were valued at 
953,000,000 roubles, Germany alone contri- 
buted goods computed at 440,000,000. These 
consisted mainly of raw cotton, machinery, 
prepared skins, chemical products, and wool. 
How steadily our rivals kept ousting the 
British out of Russian markets by those 
means may be gathered from the following 
comparative tables. The percentage of Russia's 
requirements supplied by the two competing 
nations varied, during the fifteen years between 
1898 and 1913, as follows— 



Year. 


Germany 


supplied. 


Brita 


1898-1902 . 


. 34*6 pe 


r cent. 


18*6 


1903-1907 . 


. 37-2 




14-8 


1908-1910 . 


. 41-6 




13-4 


1911 . 


. 45-4 




122 


1912 . 


. 47-5 




12-6 


1913 . 


. 49-6 




133 



In the year 1901 Germany supplied 31 per 



72 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

cent, of the total value of Russia's imports ; 
in 1905 her contribution was 42 per cent. ; 
and the increase went steadily forward, reach- 
ing over 50 per cent, in the year 1913. If we 
add to this the net profits of German industrial 
and commercial undertakings in the Russian 
Empire, we may form a notion of the appro- 
priateness of the comparison which likened 
the Tsardom to a vast German colony. The 
entire economic system of the country was 
rapidly approaching the colonial type. And 
to these economic results one should add the 
political. 

It is fair to assume that at the outset the 
main motive of this industrial invasion was 
the quest of commercial profit. Subconsciously 
political objects may have been vaguely present 
to the minds of these pioneers, as indeed they 
have ever been to the various categories of 
German emigrants in every land, European 
and other. But in the first instance the 
creation of German industries in Russia was 
part of a deliberate plan to elude the heavy 
tariffs on manufactured goods. It has been 
aptly described by an Italian publicist 1 as 
legal contraband, and it supplies us with a 
striking example of German enterprise and 
tenacity. It attained its object fully. About 
three-fourths of the textile and metallurgical 
production in the Tsardom, the entire chemical 
industry, the breweries, 85 per cent, of the 
electrical works and 70 per cent, of gas 
production were German. And of the capital 
invested in private railways no less than 
628,000,000 roubles belongs to Germans. Even 
Russian municipalities were wont to apply to 
Germany for their loans, and of the first issues 
1 Virginio Gayda. 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 78 

of thirty-five Russian municipal loans no less 
than twenty -two were raised in the Fatherland. 

The necessity of waging war against this 
potent enemy within the gates intensified 
Russia's initial difficulties to an extent that 
can hardly be realized abroad, and was a 
constant source of unexpected and disconcert- 
ing obstacles. Some time before the opening 
of the war, a feeling of restiveness, an impulse 
to throw off the German yoke, had been 
gradually displaying itself in the Press, in 
commercial circles, and in the Duma. These 
aspirations and strivings were focussed in the 
firm resolve of the Russian Government, under 
M. Kokofftseff, to refuse to renew the Treaty 
of Commerce which was enabling Germany 
to flood the Empire with her manufactures 
and to extort a ruinous tribute from the 
Russian nation. Two years more and the 
negotiations on this burning topic would have 
been inaugurated, and there is little doubt 
in my mind — there was none in the mind of 
the late Count Witte — that the upshot of these 
conversations would have been a Russo- 
German war. For there was no other less 
drastic way of freeing the people from the 
domination of German technical industries 
and capital, and the consequent absorption 
of native enterprise. 

When diplomatic relations were broken off, 
and war was finally declared, Germany was 
already the unavowed protectress of Russia. 
And when people point, as they frequently 
do, to the war as the greatest blunder ever 
committed by the Wilhelmstrasse since the 
Fatherland became one and indivisible, I feel 
unable to see with them eye to eye. Seem- 
ingly it was indeed an egregious mistake, but 



74 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

so obvious were the probable consequences 
which made it appear so that even a German 
of the Jingo type would have gladly avoided 
it had there not been another and less 
obvious side to the problem. We are not to 
forget that in Berlin it was perfectly well 
known that Russia was determined to with- 
draw from her Teutonic neighbour the series 
of one-sided privileges accorded to her by 
the then existing Treaty of Commerce, and 
that this determination would have been per- 
sisted in, even at the risk of war. And for 
war the year 1914 appeared to be far more 
auspicious to the German than any subsequent 
date. 

Handicapped by these foreign parasites who 
were systematically deadening the force of 
its arm, the Russian nation stood its ground 
and Germany drew the sword. 

Improvisation — the worst possible form of 
energy in a war crisis — was now the only 
resource left to the Tsar's Ministers. And the 
financial problems had first of all to be faced. 
In this, as in other spheres, the country was 
bound by and to Germany, so that the task 
may fairly be characterized as one of the most 
arduous that was ever tackled by the Finance 
Minister of any country — even if we include 
the resourceful Calonne. And M. Bark, who 
had recently come into office, was new not 
only to the work, but also to the politics of 
finance in general. Happily, his predecessor, 
who, whatever his critics may advance to 
the contrary, was one of the most careful 
stewards the Empire has ever possessed, had 
accumulated in the Imperial Bank a gold 
reserve of over 1,603,000,000 roubles, besides 
a deposit abroad of 140,720,000 roubles. Inci- 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 75 

dentally it may be noted that no other bank 
in the world has ever disposed of such a vast 
gold reserve. 

Although one of the richest countries in 
Europe, Russia's wealth is still under the earth, 
and therefore merely potential. Her burden 
of debt was heavy. For at the outbreak of 
the war the disturbing effects of the Manchurian 
campaign and its domestic sequel, which had 
cost the country 3,016,000,000 roubles, had 
not yet been wholly shaken off. And, unlike 
her enemy, Russia had no special war fund 
to draw upon. As the national industries 
were unable to furnish the necessary supplies 
to the army, large orders had to be placed 
abroad and paid for in gold. At the same 
moment Russia's export trade practically 
ceased, and together with it the one means 
of appreciably easing the strain. The issue 
of paper money in various forms was increased, 
loans were raised, private capital was with- 
drawn from the country, various less abundant 
sources of public revenue vanished, and the 
favourable balance of trade dropped from 
442,000,000 roubles to 85,500,000. Germany, 
on the other hand, possessed her war fund, 
in addition to which she had levied a property 
tax of a milliard marks a year before the 
outbreak of hostilities ; she further drew in 
enormous sums in gold from circulation, and 
generally mobilized her finances systematically. 

But Russia was compelled to improvise, 
to make bricks without straw. Her war on 
a front of two thousand versts long had to be 
waged with whatever materials happened to 
be available. Japan — who, I have little doubt, 
will be found at the close of the great struggle 
to have benefited largely by her pains — exerted 



76 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

herself to provide munitions for her new friend 
and ally. The United States, Great Britain and 
France also contributed their quota. For many 
of these orders placed abroad gold had to be 
exported, and as Russia has no other natural 
way of importing gold but by selling corn, 
which there were no means of transporting, 
a sensible depreciation of the rouble resulted. 
Great Britain and France have also had to 
make heavy purchases abroad for their military 
needs, but these two countries can still export 
wares extensively and keep the payments 
in gold within certain limits. Even Italy 
receives a noteworthy part of her annual 
revenue in the shape of emigrants' remittances 
from abroad. But once Russia's gates were 
closed and her corn had to remain in the 
granaries, elevators, or at railway stations, 
the shortage in her revenue became absolute. 
During the first three months of the year 1915 
the value of Russian exports over the Finnish 
frontier and the Caucasian coast of the Black 
Sea was only 23,000,000 roubles, showing a 
falling off of about 93 per cent., as compared 
with the worth of the produce exported during 
the corresponding three months of the preceding 
year. 

It is a curious fact that part of this reduced 
trade continued to be carried on with Germany 
for months after the war had begun. A 
Russian publicist has remarked that at the 
opening of the campaign the voice of the 
nation was heard saying : " Corn we have 
in plenty, and vegetables and salt. It is we 
who feed Europe. Germany will therefore 
starve without our corn. Our armies may 
retreat, but our corn will go with them; and 
the more the Germans advance into Russia, 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 77 

the further they are away from their bread." 
And in this the average Russian saw a pledge 
of victory. But before six months had lapsed, 
the everyday man grew indignant. For he 
learned that his corn was being conveyed 
through Finland and Sweden into Germany, 
and in such vast quantities as had never 
before been heard of. Here is a street scene 
illustrative of this traffic and the feelings 
it aroused. A long string of carts laden with 
flour blocks in one of the Petrograd streets 
leading to a bridge over the Neva; a General 
walking with his wife stops one of the drivers 
and asks : " Wherever are you taking the 
flour to?" "Where do you suppose? Sure 
we're taking it to the Germans. We have 
to feed the creatures. They are a bit faint." 
" There you see ! " exclaimed the General 
to his wife ; " didn't I tell you ? And every 
morning without fail the same long line of 
carts blocks the streets while our corn is being 
taken to the Germans ! " x It is to be feared 
that this commerce has not yet wholly ceased. 
For the Russians, like ourselves, are con- 
siderate of the Germans. 

That that story of trading with the enemy 
is no idle anecdote is evident from the circum- 
stance, based on official Russian statistics, 
that during ten months from August to May, 
while the war was being waged relentlessly 
between the two empires, Russia bought from 
Germany no less than 36,000,000 roubles' 
worth of manufactures. How much the Cen- 
tral Empires purchased from Russia, I am 
unable to say. That commerce is one of the 
almost inevitable consequences of improvisa- 
tion and one of the most sinister. Some 
1 Cf. Novoye Vremya, February 24, 1915. 



78 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

months after the outbreak of the war the 
Imperial Government levied a duty of a hun- 
dred per cent, on all commodities coming 
from Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Turkey. 
That was assumed to be a prohibitive tariff. 
But it failed to keep out imports from the 
Fatherland. In the one month of April 1915, 
Germany sent 3,000,000 roubles' worth of 
manufactured goods into Russia, and in May 
2,500,000 roubles' worth. And the Allied 
Press was then descanting on the stagna- 
tion in German trade and the starvation 
of the German people. The explanation of 
this anomaly lies in the unforeseen and 
enormous scarcity and rise of prices in the 
home markets. Some metal wares — for in- 
stance, various kinds of instruments and of wire 
appliances, etc. — are not to be had in Russia 
for love or money, consequently a hundred per 
cent, duty is but a heavy tax paid by the 
consumer, not an effective prohibition. 1 Since 
then, I am assured, the Government has 
adopted stringent measures which some people 
believe to have put an end to that form of 
trading with the enemy. 

It is hard for foreigners to realize the plight 
to which Russia has been reduced by the closing 
of her gates. As the Nile waters were the 
source of Egypt's prosperity, so the abundant 
Russian harvests constitute the life-giving 
ichor which flows in the veins of the Russian 
nation. Without superfluous corn for ex- 
portation, the State would be unable to meet 
its obligations, maintain its solvency, or pro- 
vide the motive power of progress. The 
exportation of agricultural produce was the 
fountain head not only of Russia's material 
1 Cf. Utro Rossiyi, August 28, 1915. 



GERMANY AND RUSSIA 79 

well-being, but of her moral and cultural 
evolution : everything, in a word, was de- 
pendent upon plentiful harvests and extensive 
sales of cereals abroad. And, suddenly, the 
gates were closed, the corn was stored, and the 
nation left without its revenue. Nobody but 
a Russian, or one who has lived long in the 
country, can realize fully all that this tremend- 
ous blow connotes. Parenthetically, it may 
be remarked that it adds a motive, and one 
of the most potent, to those which inspire 
the heroic sacrifices of the people, quickening 
the flame of devotion to their Allied cause. 
Russia is now literally fighting for her own 
liberty, for escape from the iron circle that 
shuts her off from the sea, and isolates her 
from the western world in which it is her 
ambition and her mission to play a helpful 
part. 

One needs no further explanation why the 
Russian Government put pressure upon M. 
Delcasse and Sir Edward Grey to open the 
Dardanelles route for the Russian corn. 
Neither is it to be wondered at that while the 
Allied Forces in Gallipoli were still grappling 
with the Turks, the Tsar's Ministers should 
have thrust into the foreground the question 
of Constantinople and the Straits, and insisted 
upon an immediate pragmatic settlement. 
True, that was not statesmanship; it was 
anything but political wisdom; but at any 
rate it was human on the part of all concerned. 
If this Titanic struggle, in which Russia is 
perhaps the greatest sufferer, is to bring her 
any palpable and enduring advantage, this, 
it was urged, can take but one form — freedom 
from the preposterous restraints that bar her 
way to the sea, and through the sea to the 



80 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

outside world. This and other pleas were 
powerful; but for this very reason and for 
the purpose of realizing her natural striving 
I personally would have temporarily negatived 
the Russian proposal and left nothing undone 
to ensure its withdrawal. For if I were 
asked to point to the efficient cause of the 
Allies' present lamentable plight in the Near 
East, I should single out this premature 
arrangement and its necessary consequences. 
For Roumania and Bulgaria were at the 
moment as bitterly opposed to Russia's over- 
lordship in the Dardanelles and her possession 
of Constantinople as were France and Great 
Britain in the days of yore. And they 
embodied their opposition in acts. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE STATESMANSHIP OF THE ENTENTE 

One of the most amazing phenomena of 
Entente statesmanship during the present 
European struggle, is the offhand readiness 
with which the Governments of France and 
Great Britain, yielding to abstract reasoning 
founded upon gratuitous assumptions, not only 
reversed the policy of centuries but committed 
themselves to a wholly new departure which 
was certain to raise up enemies to the Entente, 
to render its task immeasurably more arduous, 
and to lessen its means of achieving success. 
However well Russia deserved of her allies, 
however unquestionable her claim to the city 
of Constantine, no less suitable a moment 
could have been selected to press that claim 
than the spring of 1915. The only evidence 
we possess that the British statesmen primarily 
responsible for this capital blunder were con- 
scious of the fateful character of this commit- 
ment, is the extreme care they took to have 
their responsibility shared by the members 
of the Opposition, which at that time was not 
represented in the Cabinet. But even with 
this indication before us, we cannot believe 
that even now this premature solution of a 
secular problem on lines suggested by transient 
episodes of a military campaign, has struck 
the responsible statesmen in proportion to its 
specific weight, the depth of its importance, 

G 81 



82 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

and the nature of its consequences. To take 
but one of these, we find that towards the end 
of the second year of the campaign, Turkey- 
is one of the two key-positions of the inter- 
national situation. To conclude a separate 
peace with that Power is become a pressing, 
and would also be a feasible, task were it not 
that this earmarking of Constantinople for 
Russia constitutes an impassable barrier. No 
Turkish Cabinet would or could conclude a 
separate peace and strike up friendship with 
the nations that are making ready to deprive the 
Caliph of his capital. It would be a mistake, 
however, to assume that this premature allot- 
ment of Constantinople to Russia is the only 
obstacle to the conclusion of a separate peace 
with Turkey. There are also hindrances of a 
military nature which would have to be dis- 
placed before any decisive move in this direc- 
tion could be expected of the young Turks. 

But it cannot be gainsaid that the most 
formidable obstacle is that. Neither can it be 
questioned that that premature arrangement 
will, if the Allies emerge victorious from the 
ordeal, thrust into the foreground of practical 
politics a whole group of problems the most 
delicate and dangerous that were ever yet 
tackled by the inadequately equipped diplo- 
macy of the Allied Governments. It is then 
that the Entente Powers will fully realize the 
deluge to which they made such haste to 
open the sluice-gates in the spring of 1915. 
And the only way practicable out of this blind 
alley would be the spontaneous abandonment 
by the Russian Government of the right it pos- 
sesses, which however the Allies will certainly 
never call in question. Whether the Tsar's 
Government believes such a sacrifice necessary, 



STATESMANSHIP OF ENTENTE 83 

and whether, if they did, they could summon 
up the courage requisite to make it, are 
questions which Russia's loyal allies have 
neither the right nor the wish to raise. We 
will carry out our obligations in the letter and 
the spirit. If the Russian people, in the person 
of their responsible organ, should renounce for 
the moment the claims which we have formally 
recognized and undertaken to enforce, this 
decision will have been come to spontaneously 
and without pressure or advice from their allies. 
The extent to which the Teuton had his 
own way among the easy-going Russian people 
is hardly to be realized. It would be certainly 
inexplicable in an empire governed on national 
lines and conscious of its mission. For un- 
limited pliancy was the quality which German 
importunity evoked on the part of the highest 
authorities. One of many examples is worth 
recording. Among all industrial enterprises 
the Russian Government is most sensitive 
about that of high explosives. The manu- 
facture of these they had always rigorously 
reserved for their own people, on obvious 
grounds. Well, the moment the Germans 
resolved to break down this barrier, they 
found the means to do it despite the objection 
raised by the Russian Press that it would be 
dangerous to confide the production of high 
explosives to foreigners and superlatively dan- 
gerous to confide it to prospective enemies. 
The prospective enemy carried the point, and 
the manufacture of high explosives was handed 
over to a German company, which built works 
for the purpose near the Russian capital, and 
had its headquarters and board of directors in 
Berlin ! x 

1 Novoye Vremya, June 24, 1915. 



84 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

As in Italy, so in the Tsardom, one of the 
principal levers of Teuton interpenetration 
was the regulation of the national trade and 
industry. That is to say, these were allowed 
to subsist and thrive up to, but not beyond, 
the point at which they were useful as adjuncts 
of German enterprise. And the regulators 
were principally two : the Treaty of Commerce 
extorted from the Tsar's Government during 
the embarrassments caused by the Manchurian 
campaign, and the German banks, which in 
the empire paraded as Russian, just as in 
Italy they were decked as Italian. Many of 
those financial institutions were but branches 
of German houses, and their methods were 
identical with those of the Banca Com- 
merciale : long credits and easy modes of 
repayment offered to all those who agreed 
to deal with German firms, while discredit, 
ostracism, and ruin threatened the recalcitrant. 
And as Italian money and Italian institutions 
were employed as instruments of German inter- 
penetration in foreign countries, 1 so Russian 
funds and banks were used as helps to German 
interpenetration in Belgium and other lands. 

A noteworthy instance of the ingenuity 
with which this intricate mechanism was 
worked came to light shortly before the out- 
break of the war. In Brussels there was a 
branch of the Petrograd International Bank 
which purported to be a purely Russian con- 
cern. But once the Kaiser had sent his ulti- 
matum to the Tsar's Government, the Russian 
mask was doffed by the Brussels agency, 
which forthwith appeared in its true colours 
as a potent instrument of germanization in 
Belgium. There was found to be almost 

1 For example, the Banca Franco-Italiana in Brazil. 



STATESMANSHIP OF ENTENTE 85 

nothing Russian about the bank but the name. 
The staff, the language spoken, the methods 
of business, the political sympathies, the aims 
of the operations were all German. Out of the 
forty-three permanent members of the staff, 
thirty were German subjects, six Austrians, 
two German-Swiss, two Belgians, one was a 
Dutchman, one Turk, and there was a solitary 
Russian. The moment Count Berchtold pre- 
sented his ultimatum to Serbia this " Rus- 
sian " bank refused to change any Russian 
bank-notes on any terms and let it be under- 
stood that they were valueless. A panic on 
the Belgian market was the immediate con- 
sequence. Russian travellers had to deposit 
their jewellery in pawn and pay exorbitant 
rates of interest on loans. The bank itself 
practised a kind of usury, and advanced only 
sixty per cent, of the face value of notes issued 
by the Imperial Bank of Russia. When the 
Belgian Government, after the declaration of 
war, began to tackle German espionage, this 
" Russian " bank was found to be one of the 
strongholds of the military spies. Certain of 
the employees were permanent agents of the 
German Military Attache, and were at the same 
time inscribed as members of the staff of the 
Deutsche Bank of Berlin. 

All those well-thought-out and successfully 
executed schemes may bear in upon the 
British people some notion of what is meant 
by German organization and co-ordination, 
and may also help them to gauge the chances 
of success, military, diplomatic and economic, 
on which the Allies, with their easy-going 
ways, their hope of somehow " blundering 
through," and their lack of combination and 
of plan — can rely when pitted against a 



86 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

mighty organism, disposing of the most re- 
doubtable forces ever created by human science 
and skill, directed by a single mind, and 
served with ascetic self-abnegation and re- 
ligious ardour by over a hundred million 
people. The courage and faith of the Allies 
in gazing for years upon this portentous engine 
of destruction without making suitable pro- 
vision for the day when it would be turned 
against themselves, will fill future generations 
with amazement. 

No bare enumeration of details can convey 
an adequate idea of the vastness, compactness 
and potency of the German organization which 
kept the Russian Colossus partially paralysed 
at home, while the Kaiser's armies were dealing 
it stunning blows on the battlefield. It is a 
revelation which will be followed by a new 
birth of the whole political world. The German 
colonists, the wandering German commercial 
travellers who acted as political spies, the 
various banks, joint-stock companies, religious 
sects, journals, reviews, schools, clubs, Lutheran 
pastors, and other Teuton agents, were but 
so many wheels and springs of the mighty 
machine which was set in motion and kept 
working by the political leaders in Berlin. 
For all these firms and enterprises and in- 
dividuals from the Fatherland scattered over 
the length and breadth of the Tsardom were 
welded together in one vast organism by far- 
seeing politicians who canalized every impor- 
tant current of the nation's life and imparted 
to it the direction which German interests 
required. No enterprise was too vast, no 
detail too trivial, for the attention of these 
moulders of Germany's destinies. 

All those activities, commercial, financial, 



STATESMANSHIP OF ENTENTE 87 

industrial, journalistic, religious, political, the 
German mind combined into a single idea, the 
co-ordinate parts of which were studied and 
regulated, not by party chiefs, but by qualified 
experts, who, although specialists, subjected 
them to organic treatment. In this respect 
the German may be likened to a massive sombre 
figure who, surrounded by a crowd of sprightly 
shadowy nobodies, discoursing with easy 
frivolity on grave subjects, is engrossed with 
the task of destroying a great part of the frame- 
work of the world in order to rebuild it after 
his own plan. Unfortunately the extraordinary 
enlargement of interest which marks the latter- 
day political conceptions, and inspires the 
fateful action of Germany's acknowledged 
leaders, breeds in the allied peoples not so much 
a stern resolve to tame that revolutionary 
nation at all costs, as a sentimental longing for 
the return of the idyllic past, and an illusive 
hope that by dint of mild Christian charity it 
may yet be brought back. 



CHAPTER VII 

TEUTON POLITICS 

It is this Teutonic power of looking far 
ahead, this profundity of vision, this mingled 
comprehensiveness and concentration, and the 
marked success with which these qualities have 
hitherto been exercised to the lasting detriment 
of the Entente nations which looked on and 
naively applauded, that fill the thoughtful 
student with misgivings about the future. 
True, it may not be too late for effective coun- 
ter measures. But two conditions are mani- 
festly essential to the successful application of 
any remedy : first, that its necessity should be 
felt and realized ; and, second, that the scrupu- 
losity which at present hesitates to apply drastic 
measures should yield to higher considerations 
than those of individual delicacy of sentiment 
and over-refined humanitarianism. When an 
individual abuses laws and restraints which 
bind his fellow-men, in order to inflict a deadly 
injury on them, it is meet that they should 
free themselves from those checks in their 
dealings with him. For example, it may be 
theoretically wrong, after the conclusion of 
the present struggle, for our people to bear such 
a grudge against the individual German as 
would exclude him from communion and 
intercourse with the nations of the Entente. 
And this principle would seem to apply with 
greater force to those Germans who might be 

88 



TEUTON POLITICS 89 

willing to abandon their nationality and 
identify their aims, interests and strivings with 
those of the nation in which they would fain 
become incorporated. But when we reflect 
that almost every German, whatever his calling, 
how profound soever his debt of gratitude 
to a foreign people, considers himself first and 
always a member of his own country, works 
for its interests to the detriment of all others, 
and does not scruple to violate moral laws and 
social traditions in order to betray his new 
friends, we may well ask in virtue of what 
precept we should abstain from ostracizing him 
from the British Empire. His second nation- 
ality is so often a mere mask to enable him to 
perpetrate black treason, and it is so openly 
thus regarded by his own Government, which 
upholds and solemnly sanctions the principle, 
that it would be inexplicable folly on the part 
of the British nation to aid and abet its 
enemies by admitting them to the freedom of 
the community without taking effective pre- 
cautions against treason. 

And yet there is a large body of men in this 
country, as in France and Italy, who condemn 
the demand for these precautions as un- 
christian and impolitic. Such laxness is the 
soil in which thrives the upas tree whose shade 
has so long darkened the organs of our empire 
and now threatens to blight the whole organism. 

An all-important feature in the controversy 
which has arisen over the naturalization of 
German subjects is the utterly amoral view of 
it which underlies the attitude of the Kaiser's 
Government. According to these authorities, 
whose utterances and acts are decisive and 
final, a German, unlike every other subject, 
may swear allegiance to two states, of which 



90 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

one is his Fatherland, without being bound 
by his oath to the other. Various reasons, 
including material interests, may, it is argued, 
make it desirable that he should acquire citizen- 
ship in a foreign land ; and the Kaiser's Govern- 
ment, for the good of the empire, recognizes 
this necessity and facilitates the process by a 
law. This law, which was enacted in July 
1913, authorizes the born German subject, 
having first made known his intention and 
motive, to swear allegiance to a foreign state 
without forfeiting, or intending to forfeit, the 
rights or escaping from the duties which flow 
from his German citizenship. Now this is 
a privilege which not even the Pope has ever 
claimed the faculty of according. 

From the point of view of international 
law this double naturalization is inadmissible. 
Every individual in the community of nations 
is the subject of a certain state, and only of 
one, and whenever the interests of that state 
run counter to those of any other, he is bound 
legally as well as morally to promote the 
former to the best of his ability and means. 
The Teuton doctrine and practice are that 
Germans may insinuate themselves into a 
country, and in the guise of loyal citizens 
become conversant with its secrets, and then 
use them to its hurt. In the light of this law, 
which was a custom long before it became a 
statute, the number of Germans naturalized 
in various countries grew amazingly during 
the past fifteen years. In France, for example, 
where there were only 38,000 foreigners natural- 
ized in the year 1896 and 65,000 in 1901, the 
figure reached 90,000 in 1906 and 120,000 five 
years later. And of these, four-fifths were 
Germans and Austrians. Many Germans first 






TEUTON POLITICS 91 

became Swiss or British subjects in order the 
more easily to acquire the rights of Frenchmen. 
One in particular, named Wilhelm Hellpern, 
first became a Belgian, then as Willy Hellpern 
a British subject, and finally, with a view to 
obtaining a place on the Board of the Societe 
Francaise de l'lndustrie Chimique, applied for 
and received naturalization in France. This 
" Willy " Hellpern was a representative of the 
Central Gesellschaft fur chemische Industrie. 1 

When war was declared in 1914 hundreds of 
Germans applied for papers of naturalization in 
Switzerland, and obtained them from various 
little Swiss communes which were in sore want 
of funds. Spies eager to place their machina- 
tions under the protection of Swiss citizenship 
found smooth ways to the desired goal. In the 
single canton of Zurich demands for naturaliza- 
tion rose from 260 during the nine months 
ending in October 1913, 2 to 732 in the corre- 
sponding nine months of 1915. Several cases 
of fraud were discovered during this rapid 
process of transforming foreign into Swiss 
citizens : one of the most salient being that of 
Friedrich Wilhelm Frank, a German who had 
taken out his naturalization papers in England 
and then decided to shake off his acquired 
British citizenship for that of the Helvetian 
Republic. As Frank had not been resident 
in Switzerland during the two years required 
by the law of that country he applied and 
paid for a false certificate of residence, and in 
this way achieved his object. But the trick 
was finally discovered and the naturalization 
cancelled. 

We may protest as vigorously as we will 

1 Cf. Hors du Joug allemand, par Leon Daudet. 

2 The number for the entire year was 350. 



92 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

against this infamous troth-mongering which 
is destructive of international relations, and 
indirectly of social intercourse, but no respon- 
sible government can afford to ignore the 
necessity of guarding against its consequences. 
For it is no ephemeral manifestation of tem- 
perament, nor the passing whim of a political 
party or a class. The law of double citizenship, 
coupled with a plenary indulgence for treason 
and perjury in the cause of the Fatherland, is 
but the solemn consecration of a principle 
which was long practised and is warmly 
approved by the entire German people. The 
Berlin Government publicly invoked it during 
the latter half of the year 1915, under circum- 
stances which remove doubts on this score. 
On one and the same day in August that year 
all German official and non-official journals 
published a notice, which ran as follows : "It 
is alleged that in neutral countries, and par- 
ticularly in the United States of America, men 
of German extraction " (the word citizenship is 
not used, but extraction), " are employed as 
workmen, engineers or in other capacities in 
the production of war munitions for our 
enemies. All those who thus reinforce the 
military strength of our foes, thereby make 
the prosecution of the war more difficult for 
Germany, and not only burden themselves 
with a heavy load of moral turpitude, but also 
expose themselves — and many of them are 
seemingly unaware of this — to the opera- 
tion of the German laws which punish high 
treason." 

In other words, subjects of, say the Ameri- 
can Republic, who were born there of German 
parents or grandparents and never acknow- 
ledged any other government nor possessed 



TEUTON POLITICS 93 

the citizenship of any other country, become 
guilty of high treason if they dare to avail 
themselves of the plenitude of the rights 
which that citizenship confers. They may not 
work for firms which supply the Allies because 
their fathers, or it may be only their grand- 
fathers, happened to be Germans. The moral 
duties of German subjects still lie heavy on 
them, and they must execute the Kaiser's will 
to-day on pain of being dealt with as traitors 
to the Fatherland. 

Monstrous principles and revolting procedure 
of this kind are calculated to kindle a blaze of 
indignation in people who realize their effects 
and set value on the boons of civilization or 
Christianity. They are among the many new 
ideas which Kultur has contributed to the 
stock of weapons destructive of modern society. 
One might term them the asphyxiating gases 
of German international politics. In keeping 
with these teachings and practices were the 
theft of foreign passports by the German 
Government which handed them over to spies, 
as in the case of Lody, who was executed in 
London in the early part of the war. Thus the 
binding force of moral and of human law is 
dissolved whenever it clashes with German 
national, military, or commercial interests. 
This dogma lies at the roots of Kultur. 

By the time war was declared, Germany had 
stretched forth her tentacles into various lands 
and was draining the life-juices of many peoples. 
Her footing in Italy, Russia, Belgium and 
France was firm. Observant students of inter- 
national politics fancied they could determine 
the approximate date when, if the then rate 
of progress were maintained, Germany's over- 
lordship over Europe would be definitely 



94 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

established and all armed conflicts on the 
Continent become thenceforth meaningless. 
They were all the more puzzled at what they 
set down as the egregious folly of jeopardizing 
the precious fruits of forty years' well-sustained 
labours by precipitating a tremendous conflict 
of doubtful issue. But besides the sudden 
temptation to utilize a conjuncture of excep- 
tionally favourable promise, the leaders of the 
Teutonic nations felt moved to appeal to arms 
by certain slow, but steady, currents which 
threatened to change the situation to Ger- 
many's detriment in the space of another few 
years. 

With the remoter causes of the Kaiser's 
fatal resolve, we are not now concerned. It 
may suffice to know that they were numerous 
and that the trend of their operation had been 
for a few months unmistakable. Time, which 
was working wonders for the Teuton in one 
direction, was raising up redoubtable enemies 
against him in another. For one thing Russia 
was becoming transfigured. The dry bones of 
the nation which the Germans often declared 
was good only as ethnic manure had had life 
and a soul breathed into them by the great 
agrarian reform of which the credit belongs to 
Witte and Stolypin. The latter statesman in 
a series of conversations had in 1906 opened 
his mind to me on the subject, and frankly 
avowed that the Government, having gone 
astray in its estimate of the Russian peasants 
who turned out to be revolutionary and 
anarchistic, was resolved to render them con- 
servative by giving them land and an interest 
in the maintenance of law and order. That, 
he informed me, was the aim and origin of the 
agrarian law, and I expounded the theory, its 



TEUTON POLITICS 95 

working and its anticipated consequences, in 
a series of articles published at the time. 1 

Down to the year 1861 the Russian serfs 
had been mostly bound to the soil. They were 
emancipated by Alexander II., who ordered 
each landowner to make over to the serfs as 
much of his landed property as was being 
actually cultivated by these. Wherever this 
amount seemed too extensive for the support 
of a family it was whittled down and the 
residue left with the landlord. Each of the 
various lots thus expropriated was given not 
to an individual, nor to a family, but to the 
village community. Each field was cut into 
as many strips as there were farms, and each 
farm had the use of one. Every year the 
peasants had to pay a certain sum to the 
landlord until the land was wholly redeemed, 
and liability for these payments, like the 
possession of the land, was common. Hence 
the drunkards and the lazy paid little or 
nothing. It was the community which decided 
when the sowing and when the reaping should 
take place. The results of this system were 
baneful. And little by little the more enter- 
prising peasants who had no motive to improve 
the value of the land which they were allowed 
for a time to cultivate, migrated to the towns 
and joined the growing army of working men. 

How long this state of things would have 
continued, if these immediate consequences had 
formed the only objection to it, is uncertain. 
But the Revolution of 1905-6 rendered it 
wholly untenable. The peasantry, on whom 
the Tsar and the Government counted for 
support, readily followed the lead of every 
anarchist and revolutionary who dangled the 
1 In the Daily Telegraph. 



96 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

promise of free land before their eyes, and 
gutted or burned the manors of the landlords. 
With no conception of the sacredness, nor, 
indeed, of the nature of property, they seized 
what they could by force, and were gravely 
disappointed when it was re-taken from them 
by law. Stolypin's scheme, as he himself pro- 
pounded it to me, was to enable the peasant 
to acquire the land he tilled, and not merely the 
scattered strips, but a compact farm capable 
of supporting himself and his family. And 
the system of collective liability for payments 
to the State was abolished, together with 
that of collective land-ownership. 

This was in truth a genial reform, and the 
business-like way in which it was carried out 
did credit to the late Minister and the people. 
Even now it is far from completed, but already 
there are about six million peasant farms cut 
out and allotted. In European Russia approx- 
imately as many more remain to be apportioned. 
The effects of this innovation were rapid and 
encouraging. The value of the land rose 
enormously in consequence of the intenser 
culture and the increased yield. Under the 
old arrangement Russia's harvest of cereals 
was barely enough to feed the population 
inadequately, to supply seed and to enable a 
limited amount of produce to be exported. 
And as this limited amount was in practice 
often exceeded, the food supply of the peasantry 
was cut down in proportion. At present all 
this has changed for the better and changed to 
a greater extent than the outside world realizes. 
One of the consequences of this betterment, 
coupled with the decrease of drunkenness, is 
the greater purchasing power of the peasant 
and the growth of his requirements. So bene- 



TEUTON POLITICS 97 

ficial and evident were the effects of this 
reform, that some patriotic Russians gladly 
saw their Government go to the very extreme 
of pliancy towards Germany rather than run 
the risk of a war and the danger of a break in 
this remarkable career of national regeneration. 
The process was noted and gauged by the Ger- 
mans, who awakened to the fact that, in a few 
years more, the legend of Ilya Murometz would 
be exemplified in latter-day Russia, and a 
Colossus arise among the nations, which would 
hinder the tide of Teutondom from inundating 
Europe for all time. 

Other considerations of a more pressing 
character weighed with the statesmen of the 
Wilhelmstrasse, whose survey of the inter- 
national situation was, at any rate, compre- 
hensive. Renascent Russia, for example, was, 
as we saw, resolved to withdraw from the Ger- 
man Empire the one-sided advantages accorded 
by the Commercial Treaty. And as this ques- 
tion would in any case become acute within two 
years, that date was one of the time-limits of 
the European war, and I ventured to designate 
it as such to two of the most prominent states- 
men of the Entente in the month of March 
1914. They both went so far as to say that 
my anticipation was extremely probable. 1 

However this may be, Germany, who works 
out her destinies by preventive wars, and 
therefore never leaves the initiative to her 
enemies or rivals, precipitated a conflict which 
would, she believed, break out in any case 
within a couple of years, and for which no more 
auspicious moment could be chosen than the 
end of July 1914, after the Kiel Canal had 

1 Count Witte went farther and fixed the end of 1915 
as the date. 

H 



98 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

been made navigable for her largest battleships 
and the harvest ingathered. 

The year and month of the historic event 
had been fixed by her leaders a considerable 
time in advance, as we now know from in- 
controvertible evidence. So, too, had the 
choice of method, which was in harmony with 
the usual formula, that Germany is never 
the apparent aggressor, and that it is her 
enemies who must be made to appear the 
partisans of preventive war. 

The principle was thus laid down by Bis- 
marck when he altered King Wilhelm's historic 
telegram from Ems : " Success essentially 
depends upon the impression which the genesis 
of the war makes on ourselves and others. It 
is important that we should be the party 
attacked." x 

Finally, the very day was determined — and 
almost on the very eve it was changed to the 
following day. 

In connection with the date and the method 
I have a curious tale to unfold which has never 
yet been recounted in western Europe. The 
incident in some respects bears an unmistak- 
able resemblance to the story of Bismarck's 
forgery of the Ems telegram and is well 
worth relating 2 and remembering. The main 
features are as follows. 

1 Bismarck : His Reflections and Reminiscences. 

2 My authority for the story is the principal observer, 
who was also an actor in a part of this subsidiary little 
drama : A. I. Markoff, who at that time represented the 
semi-official Russian Telegraph Agency, as its head 
correspondent in Berlin. He himself told me the story 
in Stockholm and authorized me to make it known. 



CHAPTER VIII 

A MACHIAVELLIAN TRICK BY WHICH 
RUSSIA'S HAND WAS FORCED 

The world is now aware, although it can 
hardly be said to realize, how closely journalism 
approaches to being a recognized organ of the 
Imperial German Government. One of the 
most influential of the Berlin journals during 
the past ten years has been the Lokal-Anzeiger. 
This paper was founded by Herr Scherl, one 
of those clever enterprising business men who 
have been so numerous, active and successful 
in the Fatherland during the past quarter of 
a century. His journal was a purely business 
concern, carried on congruously with the law 
of supply and demand and keeping pace with 
the shifting requirements of the public and 
the strongest currents in the Government. It 
had long enjoyed the reputation of being a 
semi-official organ, and it was Herr Scherl's 
ambition that it should be formally promoted 
to that rank. In February 1914 he sold the 
paper to a group of four persons, two of whom 
were Herr Schorlmeyer and Count T. Winckler, 
and all four were members of the political party 
which looked for light and leading to the Crown 
Prince and his military environment. Thus 
the Lokal-Anzeiger became the organ of the 
progressive military party, which was exerting 
itself to the utmost to force the pace of the 
Government towards the one consummation 

09 



100 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

from which the realization of Germany's dream 
of world-power was confidently expected. 
Among the privileges accorded to the Lokal- 
Anzeiger from the date of its purchase for the 
behoof of the Crown Prince onward, was that 
of publishing official military news before all 
other papers, and not later even than the 
Militar-Wochenblatt. Consequently, it thus 
became the most trustworthy source of military 
news in the Empire. This fact is worth bearing 
in mind, for the sake of the light which it 
diffuses on what follows. 

War being foreseen and arranged for, much 
careful thought was bestowed on the staging 
of the last act of the diplomatic drama in 
such a way as to create abroad an impression 
favourable to Germany. The scheme finally 
hit upon was simple. Russia was to be con- 
fronted with a dilemma which would force her 
into an attitude that would stir misgivings 
even in her friends and drive a wedge between 
her and her ally or else would involve her com- 
plete withdrawal from the Balkans. The 
latter alternative would have contented Ger- 
many for the moment, who would then have 
dispensed with a breach of the peace. For it 
would have enabled the two Central Empires 
to weld together the Balkan States and Turkey 
in a powerful federation under their joint 
protectorate, and would not only have simpli- 
fied Germany's remaining task, but have 
supplied her with adequate means of ac- 
complishing it against Russia and France 
combined. Great Britain's neutrality was 
postulated as a matter of course. 

Congruously with this plan, Russia was from 
the very outset declared to be the Power on 
which alone depended the outcome of the crisis. 



A MACHIAVELLIAN TRICK 101 

Upon her decision hung peace and war. On 
July 24, telegraphing from Vienna, I an- 
nounced this on the highest authority, 1 with 
a degree of force and clearness which left no 
room for doubt as to the aims, intentions and 
preliminary accords of the two Central Empires. 
I stated that if in the course of the Austro- 
Serbian quarrel Russia were to mobilize, 
Germany would at once answer by general 
mobilization and war. For there will, then, 
I added, be no demobilization but an armed 
conflict. Before making that grave announce- 
ment, I had had convincing assurances and 
proofs that I was setting forth an absolute and 
irrevocable decision arrived at by the Central 
Empires on grounds wholly alien to the interests 
and issues which were then engaging the Aus- 
trian and Serbian Governments, and that a belli- 
cose mood had gained a firm hold on the minds of 
the statesmen of Berlin and Vienna. Had that 
deliberate statement been subjected to ade- 
quate instead of the ordinary partial tests, the 
full significance of the crisis would have been 
realized by the Governments of the Entente. 

In the course of the negotiations which were 
then hastily improvised, Germany, who strove 
hard to gain credit for the role of disinterested 
peacemaker, gradually revealed herself as the 
chief protagonist, whereas Austria was little 
more than a pawn in the game. Disguising 
her eagerness to provoke one of the two desired 
solutions, Russia's abandonment of Serbia or 
her declaration of war, Germany succeeded in 
misleading the Governments of France and 
Britain as to her real intentions. 

While M. Poincare was in the Russian 

1 On 24th July I received this official information. It 
was published on Monday, 27th. 



102 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

capital proposing toasts and drawing roseate 
forecasts of the future, the German Ambassador 
in Paris, von Schon, was constantly in attend- 
ance at the Quai d'Orsay, endeavouring to 
impress on the minds of the Acting Minister 
and the permanent officials there, the sincerity 
of the Kaiser's eagerness for peace and the 
growing danger of Russia's aggressiveness. 
" You and we," he kept saying, " are the only 
Continental Governments which are aware of 
the magnitude of the issues and the imminence 
of the danger. You and we perceive the utter 
folly, the sheer criminality, of plunging Europe 
in the horrors of a sanguinary war for the sake 
of a petty state governed by regicides and 
assassins. What interests have you or we to 
risk the welfare of our respective nations for 
the behoof of the Serbian military party whose 
dreams of greatness border on mania ? No, it 
behoves us both to do all that lies in us to calm 
Russia's passion and induce her to listen to 
the promptings of reason and self-interest. 
You, with the powerful influence which your 
friendship and alliance impart to your counsels, 
and we by dint of example, ought to succeed in 
averting this awful peril." In this tone, Herr 
von Schon delivered his daily exhortations and 
found some willing listeners. His specious 
pleading made a deep and favourable impres- 
sion, and would perhaps have led to representa- 
tions by the French Government calculated 
to wound the susceptibilities and perhaps 
estrange the sympathies of France's ally at the 
most critical hour of the alliance, had it not 
been for the presence at the Foreign Office of 
a man whose eye was sure and whose measure- 
ment of forces, political and personal, was 
accurate. That man was M. Berthelot. Gaug- 



A MACHIAVELLIAN TRICK 103 

ing aright this insidious appeal to the centri- 
fugal forces of the political mind, he turned 
a deaf ear to von Schon's suasive efforts and 
kept the ship of state on its course, without 
swerving. In this way what seemed to the 
Berlin politicians the line of least resistance 
was adequately reinforced and a formidable, 
because crafty, attack repulsed. 

But besides attack, the Germans had also a 
problem of defence to engage their attention. 
And, curiously enough, it appears to have been 
particularly knotty in Austria. At that 
moment Count Berchtold was Minister of 
Foreign Affairs in name, but Count Tisza, the 
Hungarian Premier, was the man who thought, 
planned and acted for the Habsburg Monarchy. 
He it was who had drawn up the ultimatum 
to Serbia and made all requisite arrangements 
for co-operation with Germany. He was 
backed by the Chief of the General Staff, 
Konrad von Hoetzendorff, whose eagerness to 
provide an opportunity for displaying the 
martial qualities of the army was proverbial. 
But there were others in high places there who 
had no wish to see the Dual Monarchy drawn 
into a European war, and who would gladly 
have come to an agreement with Russia on 
the basis of such a compromise as Serbia's reply 
to the ultimatum promised to afford. Whether, 
as seems very probable, this current bade fair 
to gain the upper hand, it is still too soon to 
determine with finality. There are certainly 
many indications that this was one of the 
dangers apprehended in Berlin. Russia's 
moderation was another. And the interplay 
of the two might, had Germany held aloof, 
have led to a compromise. For this reason 
Germany did not stand aloof. 



104 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

The date fixed for the German mobilization 
was July 31. The evidence for this is to be 
found in the date printed on the official order 
which was posted up in the streets of Berlin, 
but was crossed out and replaced by the words 
" 1st of August," in writing, as there was no 
time to reprint the text. It had been expected 
in Berlin that Russia would have taken a 
decision by July 30, either mobilizing or 
knuckling down. Neither course, however, 
had been adopted. Thereupon Germany be- 
came nervous and went to work in the following 
way. 

On Thursday, July 30, at 2.25 p.m. a number 
of newspaper boys appeared in the streets of 
Berlin adjoining the Unter den Linden and 
called out lustily : " Lokal-Anzeiger Supple- 
ment. Grave News. Mobilization ordered 
throughout the Empire." Windows were 
thrown wide open and stentorian voices called 
for the Supplement. The boys were sur- 
rounded by eager groups, who bought up the 
stock of papers and then eagerly discussed the 
event that was about to change and probably 
to end the lives of many of the readers. It does 
not appear that the Supplement was sold any- 
where outside that circumscribed district. 
Now in that part of the town was situated 
Wolff's Press Bureau, where the official repre- 
sentatives of Havas and the Russian Tele- 
graphic Agency sat and worked. 

The correspondent of the latter agency, 
having read the announcement of the Lokal- 
Anzeiger, which was definitive and admitted 
of no doubt, at once telephoned the news to 
his Ambassador, M. Zverbeieff. During the 
conversation that ensued the correspondent 
was requested by the officials of the telephone 



A MACHIAVELLIAN TRICK 105 

to speak in German, not in Russian. This was 
an unusual procedure. The Ambassador could 
hardly credit the tidings, so utterly were they 
at variance with the information which he 
possessed. He requested the correspondent 
to repeat the contents of the announcement, 
and then inquired : " Can I, in your opinion, 
telegraph it to the Foreign Office?" The 
answer being an emphatic affirmative, the 
Ambassador despatched a message in cypher 
to this effect to the Russian Minister of Foreign 
Affairs. For there could be no doubt about the 
accuracy of information thus deliberately given 
to the public by the journal which possessed 
a monopoly of military news and was the organ 
of the Crown Prince. The Russian corre- 
spondent also forwarded a telegram to the 
Telegraphic Agency in Petrograd communicat- 
ing the fateful tidings. 

Within half an hour the German Ministry 
of Foreign Affairs telephoned to Wolff's Bureau 
to the effect that the report about the mobiliza- 
tion order was not in harmony with fact, and 
it also summoned the Lokal-Anzeiger to issue 
a contradiction of the news on its own account. 
This was duly done, and so rapidly that the 
second Supplement was issued at about 3 p.m. 
The explanation given by the newspaper staff 
was that they were expecting an order for 
general mobilization and had prepared a special 
Supplement announcing it. This Supplement 
was unfortunately left where the vendors saw 
it, and thinking that it was meant for circula- 
tion seized on all the copies they could find, 
rushed into the streets and sold them. On 
many grounds, however, this account is un- 
satisfactory. Copies of a newspaper supple- 
ment containing such momentous news are not 



106 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

usually left where they can be found, removed 
and sold by mere street vendors. Moreover, 
the date, July 30, was printed on the supple- 
ment, so that it was evidently meant to be 
issued, as a matter of fact it was circulated only 
in a very limited number of copies and in the 
streets around Wolff's Bureau, where it was 
certain to produce the desired effect. 

Half an hour later the correspondent of the 
Russian Agency received a request to call at 
the General Telegraph Office at once. On his 
arrival he was asked to withdraw his two 
telegrams which the Censor refused to transmit. 
To his plea that so far as he knew there was 
no censorship in Germany he received the reply 
that it had just been instituted and now de- 
clined to pass his telegrams. " In that case," 
he said, " my consent is of no importance, 
seeing that the matter is already decided." 
Finally, he asked to have his messages returned 
to him, but they would consent only to his 
reading, not to his retaining, them. 

The Russian Ambassador also despatched 
an urgent message en clair to his Government 
embodying the contradiction communicated 
by the Wilhelmstrasse. 

Now, the significant circumstance is that 
the Ambassador's first telegram stating that 
general mobilization had been officially ordered 
throughout the German Empire was forwarded 
with speed and accuracy and reached the 
Russian Foreign Minister without delay. And 
this news was communicated to the Tsar, who 
by way of counter-measure issued the order 
to mobilize the forces of the Russian Empire. 
But the Ambassador's second telegram was 
held back several hours and did not reach its 
destination until the mischief was irremediable. 



A MACHIAVELLIAN TRICK 107 

That curious incident is of a piece with the 
Bismarck's Ems telegram. 

It is by such devices that the German Govern- 
ment is wont to launch into war. The 
mentality whence they spring cannot be dis- 
carded in a year or a generation, nor will any 
Peace Treaty, however ingeniously worded, 
prevent recourse being had to them in the 
future. For this, among other reasons, more 
trustworthy guarantees than scraps of paper 
must be sought and found. 



CHAPTER IX 

GERMAN PROPAGANDA IN SCANDINAVIA 

The same breadth of vision and efficacy of 
treatment were similarly rewarded in the 
Scandinavian countries, where German pro- 
paganda, ever resourceful and many-sided, was 
facilitated by kinship of race, language, folk- 
lore and literature. Of the three kingdoms 
Sweden, the strongest, was also the most im- 
pressible owing to the further bond of fellow- 
ship supplied by a common object of distrust 
— the Russian empire. Suspicion and dislike 
of the Tsardom had been long and successfully 
inculcated by the German Press, from which 
Sweden received her supply of daily news, and 
also, as is usual in such cases, by prominent 
natives who, in obedience to motives to which 
history is indifferent, employed their influence 
to spread suspicion. Sven Hedin rendered 
invaluable services in this way to the Kaiser 
and the Fatherland, throwing the glamour of 
his name over a movement of which the ulti- 
mate tendency was national suicide. Under 
the auspices of a prussophile minority of 
Swedish politicians, a few of whom were 
supposed to favour the establishment of an 
absolute monarchy like that of Prussia, a 
clever campaign against the Tsardom was 
inaugurated. Falsehoods were concocted, 
imaginary dangers conjured up and described 
as real, and sinister Russian designs against 

108 



GERMAN PROPAGANDA 109 

the independence of Sweden and Norway were 
invoked as motives for energetic action. In 
vain the Tsar's Government protested its 
friendship for Sweden and disproved the poison- 
ous calumnies circulated by the Germans. 

In the discovery and arrest of a number 
of Russian military spies, who were as active 
in Sweden as in other lands, and whose re- 
lations with the Tsar's Military Attache in 
Stockholm were said to be proven, these 
agitators found the few solid facts that served 
them as the ground- work of their fabric of 
suspicion and calumny. 

The results of this propaganda answered 
the expectations of its German and Swedish 
organizers. Despite the quieting assurances 
given bv the ex-Premier, the late Karl Staaff 
and M. Branting, Sweden's two foremost states- 
men, the present population was thoroughly 
alarmed. They spontaneously taxed them- 
selves for new warships, insisted that a non- 
recurring war-tax identical with that of 
Germany should be imposed by the State, 
and many called for the immediate adhesion 
of Sweden to the Triple Alliance. 

One of the fixed points of Russia's policy, 
the Swedish agitators told their fellow- 
countrymen, is the acquisition of an ice-free 
port which can be utilized in winter. The 
Baltic ports do not answer this requirement, 
not only because they freeze in the cold 
season, but also, and especially, because the 
narrow Sound can be easily blocked by a 
hostile Power and Russia's ships bottled up 
in the Baltic. Hence the persevering efforts 
she made at first to get possession of the 
Dardanelles and obtain free access to the 
Mediterranean in war-time. More than once 



110 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

she was on the very point of achieving success 
there, but lack of enterprise on the part of 
her statesmen or a sudden adverse change in 
the political conjuncture foiled this scheme, 
the realization of which was put off in- 
definitely. The Persian Gulf was the next 
object of her designs, but there, too, she 
encountered a diplomatic defeat. The third 
goal lay in the Far East, where a new Russian 
empire governed by a Viceroy and possessed 
of a promising capital, was founded with 
every prospect of good fortune. But here, 
again, defective statesmanship was followed 
by failure, and the campaign against Japan 
closed the Far Eastern chapter for a long 
while. Whither, it was asked, can Russia 
turn now ? Recent events, M. Sven Hedin 
assured his countrymen, have already an- 
swered the query. Northwards. The great 
Slav Empire covets an ice-free harbour in 
Norway, and until this war broke out was 
busily engaged in compassing its end. At 
any future moment it may again start off 
on this enterprise. It is the duty of patriotic 
Swedes to thwart this nefarious project. 

A Norwegian port, it is freely admitted, 
would not fulfil all Russia's requirements. 
It would, for instance, leave much to be de- 
sired from an economic point of view. The 
resources of the hinterland would be too 
scanty. The cost of transport would be too 
heavy. But strategically it would answer 
the purpose admirably. Now this conquest 
would not be achieved without invading and 
annexing a portion of North Sweden as well. 
For it would be impossible to keep and utilize 
such an acquisition without a hinterland con- 
taining factories, workshops, wharves, docks, 



GERMAN PROPAGANDA 111 

stores and a fairly numerous population which, 
in turn, would require corn, cattle, timber, 
etc. Is it credible, asked M. Sven Hedin, 
that the southern boundary of this back-land 
could be drawn further northwards than to 
the north of Angermanland, Jamtland and 
Drontheim ? At bottom, then, it is the annex- 
ation of a vast slice of Sweden proper that 
Russia has in view. Perhaps the first route of 
the Russian army would lie on the eastern bank 
of the rivers Torne-alf and Muonio-alf and 
lead to the Lyngen Fjord. How long would 
it stop there ? Step by step it would move 
along the coast southwards to Drontheim. 
Then Norrland would be surrounded on three 
sides by Russians. " Later on they would 
tighten the noose and strangle our country. 
Are we to remain inactive during the course 
of events ? . . . The Swede in general is aware 
of the existence of this danger and knows that 
it may come upon him at any moment as a 
reality." 

In verity, no normal individual, acquainted 
with the political condition of Europe, can 
be said to know that the peril of a Russian 
invasion of Sweden exists or existed of late 
years. As a matter of fact, he knows that 
the contradictory proposition is true. 

The symptoms of Russia's alleged designs 
on Norway and Sweden are as fantastic as 
the sweeping statements by which they are 
heralded. One of them was the order issued 
by the Russian Government to build a rail- 
way bridge over the Neva in Petrograd in 
order to link the Finnish railway with all 
the other stations which are situated on the 
opposite bank of that river, as though the 
Russian capital should be the only one in 



112 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Europe without a girdle railway and Finland 
the sole section of the empire cut off from 
all the rest ! Another of these " infallible 
tokens " of Russia's machinations were the 
measures adopted to render the Finnish rail- 
ways, and, in particular, the Oesterbotten 
line, capable of transporting Russian military 
trains, by enlarging the stations, strengthening 
the bridges and rails, and other kindred ex- 
pedients. Further, a number of new lines 
were considered necessary from a strategic 
point of view, one connecting Petersburg 
with Wasa via Hiitola, Nyslott and Iyva- 
skyla. Barracks were built or ordered in 
Fredrikshamn, Kouvala, Lahtis and other 
Finnish towns, or railway centres. All these 
precautions, however, are not only explicable 
without the theory that Sweden and Norway 
are to be invaded, but they ought to have 
been adopted long ago, say unprejudiced 
military authorities, in the interests of Russia's 
home defence. Yet M. Sven Hedin concluded 
his argument with the words : " When it has 
been further established that the transport 
of Russian troops to Finland has greatly in- 
creased — and it is affirmed that there are 
already about 85,000 soldiers there — and when 
we also bear in mind that for many years past 
Sweden and likewise Norway have been visited 
by so-called knife-grinders x from Russia, no 
doubt can remain. Russia is making ready for 
an onslaught on the Northern kingdoms" 

But long before Sven Hedin and his friends 

1 Several Russian "knife-grinders" are alleged to 
have been discovered in various parts of Sweden, moving 
from place to place, with maps of various districts and 
a good deal of money in their pockets. The Swedes 
declare that they are Russian spies. 



GERMAN PROPAGANDA 113 

had begun their campaign, the ground had been 
prepared from Berlin, the work of interpenetra- 
tion had made great headway, and Germany 
was regarded by Sweden as an elder sister. For 
the economic invasion preceded the political. 
Statistics of foreign trade reveal the Teuton 
as the exporter to that country of over forty 
per cent, of the entire quantity of merchandise 
entering from abroad. 1 

Switzerland, whose position as a neutral 
oasis encircled by belligerents is fraught with 
difficulty, has long been treated as hardly 
more than an adjunct of the German empire, 
and many of the best Swiss writers, far from 
resenting this affront, welcome it as a com- 
pliment. Just as Americans occasionally write 
about " the King " when alluding to the 
British Sovereign, so the Swiss often fall into 
the way of describing the operations of " our 
army," " our cause," when alluding to the 
Kaiser's troops and German designs. 

Several times during the progress of the 
war the conduct of Swiss organizations and 
individuals towards the two groups of belli- 
gerents aroused grounded misgivings in the 
minds of the French, British and Italians 
who asked only for the observance of strict 
neutrality. One remarkable instance of the 
pro-German leanings complained of was the 
absolute and persistent refusal of the Swiss 
to submit to reasonable restrictions respecting 
the sale to Germany and Austria of goods 
exported to Switzerland by the allied countries. 
This refusal was all the more significant that 
it came after the secret acquiescence in the 

1 The value of wares she sold to Sweden in 1911 is 
computed at 275,423,000 krons as against 170,999,000 
krons' worth purchased from Great Britain. 
I 



114 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

more stringent limitations which had been 
imposed on them by the Germans. Thus two 
wholly different sets of weights and measures 
would appear to have been employed by the 
spokesmen of the little Republic in their 
dealings with the two groups of warring 
Powers. And it was always Germany who 
obtained preferential treatment. 

This bias springs from causes which are 
stable and deep-rooted. The bulk of the 
Swiss people are frankly pro- German in their 
sympathies and their military chiefs side with 
the Teuton on most of those questions of 
principle which form the line of cleavage 
between him and the allied peoples. That 
the end justifies the means, is one of those 
axioms which the authorities of the Swiss 
Republic appear to have endorsed without 
hesitation. In the month of March 1916 
two Swiss Colonels, Egli and de Wattenwyl, 
were tried on two charges which, if proved, 
would, it was somewhat hastily assumed, 
bring down severe retribution on their heads. 
It was alleged that they had communicated 
to the German military authorities important 
telegraphic messages intercepted on their way 
from the Allies. But the evidence adduced 
was deemed insufficient to bear out this in- 
dictment. The other charge was that they 
had regularly handed on the confidential 
bulletin of the Swiss General Staff to the 
military attaches of the Central Empires in 
Berne and only to them. And the count was 
proven to the satisfaction of the tribunal. 
Now this act admittedly constituted a breach 
of neutrality. Yet the Chief of the Swiss 
General Staff, Colonel Sprecher, defended the 
accused men on the singular ground that their 



GERMAN PROPAGANDA 115 

action — that is to say, a grave breach of 
neutrality to the detriment of the allied 
nations — was excusable because of the end in 
view, which was to gain in exchange useful 
information for the Intelligence Department 
of the War Office. This plea is based on the 
German military principle that the means are 
hallowed by the end. 

It is some satisfaction, however, to note that 
in the Romande cantons of the Republic a 
series of protests have been made against the 
spirit of Prussian military amorality which, 
as the pleadings and the acquittal of the 
two officers showed, permeates the military 
circles of that little State whose very existence 
depends on its neutrality. 

Kultur is widely diffused throughout the 
German-speaking cantons of Switzerland. The 
German Universities of the Republic are re- 
garded and treated as Universities of the 
Fatherland and their professors interchanged. 
And when we further reflect that Germany 
exports to Switzerland goods to the value of 
680,870,000 francs as against 347,985,000 ex- 
ported by France, who stands second on the 
list, that German Universities and those of 
German Switzerland elect their professors in- 
discriminately from among candidates of both 
countries, and that German is spoken in 
Switzerland by more than 2,500,000 inhabitants 
as against 796,244 who use French — one cannot 
affect surprise at much that called for com- 
ment before the war and provoked mild depre- 
cation throughout its first phase. 



CHAPTER X 

GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 

For two decades the Balkan States and 
Turkey had been objects of Germany's especial 
solicitude. And with reason. For the part 
allotted to them in the plan for teutonizing 
Europe was of the utmost moment. The high 
road from Berlin to the Near East passed 
through Budapest and the Balkans. And 
Austria, as the pioneer of German Kultur 
there, kept her gaze fixed and her efforts 
concentrated on Salonica. Bulgaria's good- 
will had been acquired through Ferdinand of 
Coburg, himself an Austro-Hungarian officer, 
and was maintained by Austria's energetic 
championship of Bulgaria's claims against 
Serbia. Counts Aehrenthal and Berchtold 
destined Bulgaria and Roumania to coalesce 
and form the nucleus of a permanent Balkan 
confederation to be patronized and protected 
by the Habsburgs. 

But circumstance thwarted the design. 
And after the Balkan League had done its 
work and Turkey's grasp on Europe had 
relaxed, Bulgaria, in the person of Ferdinand, 
was brought to undo what without her lead 
could not then have been achieved, to fall foul 
of her allies and smash the coalition. 

This incitement was unwelcome to many of 
Bulgaria's trusty leaders, who, much though 
they might grudge Serbia's successes and 

116 



GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 117 

rapid growth, were of opinion that Bulgaria 
would be ill-advised to break her connection 
with the Slav cause. But the leaders unex- 
pectedly found that they were being led, and 
led away from the natural friends of Bulgaria 
by the German prince who had caused the 
death of Bulgaria's greatest statesman and 
made no secret of his contempt for the Bul- 
garian people generally. Ferdinand, assuming 
autocratic power, rendered this inestimable 
service to the Teutons and fastened the Bul- 
garian State to the Central Empires. 

At some time before the outbreak of the 
war Ferdinand had struck up a compact with 
the Central Empires which bound Bulgaria 
to follow their lead. This he did at his own 
risk and on his own responsibility. I had 
grounds for believing in the existence of some 
such covenant a considerable time before the 
storm burst, but I had no tangible proof of 
it. In July 1914, however, I knew it for 
certain, but without having ascertained the 
particulars. When and by whom it had been 
signed, and what were the main stipulations 
agreed upon, still remained in the domain of 
speculation. I discovered, however, that Bul- 
garia's hands were tied; that her mourning 
for lost Macedonia would not last long; that 
the aims she pursued were the policy of the 
outlet on four seas, and the territorial separa- 
tion of Greece and Serbia; that her role in 
the Peninsula was to be predominant; that 
she had been chosen to supplant Serbia as the 
leading Balkan State, and would pay tribute 
to the Central Empires in the shape of docility 
to and ready co-operation with them; and 
that Roumania would, if she continued to 
find favour in the eyes of the statesmen of 



118 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Vienna and Berlin, be associated with Bul- 
garia, but without attaining her rank or 
acquiring her power. 

It has since been positively asserted by 
M. Filipescu, an ex-Cabinet Minister of 
Roumania, that " towards the mid- August 
1914, when the treaty was concluded which 
bound Bulgaria to Germany, the Roumanian 
Minister in Berlin, M. Beldiman, had cog- 
nizance of this treaty and apprised the 
Roumanian Government of the fact." 1 
M. Take Jonescu, the illustrious Roumanian 
statesman, has assigned a different date to 
the conclusion of the agreement, but con- 
firmed the fact of its existence in the course 
of a conversation which has also been made 
public. 2 He stated that the King of Bulgaria, 
" who is swayed more by personal rancour 
than by the interests of his people, imposed 
his policy on them. He allied himself with 
the Germans as long ago as Spring 1914. The 
treaty was taken from Sofia to Berlin by an 
official of the Deutsche Bank." 2 

Whatever doubts may prevail respecting 
the exact date, the main fact is established — 
Ferdinand bound Bulgaria to the Central 
Empires. 

Personal interest as well as State reasons 
determined him to place himself under 
Austro-German protection. It was at Aus- 
tria's instigation that he had spurned the 
advice of his official advisers, treacherously 
attacked his allies and brought down defeat 
upon his armies and discredit upon himself. 
But the Habsburg Government had under- 

1 See he Temps, October 31, 1915. 

2 Mr. M. Civinini of the Corner e della Sera. See 
Corriera della Sera, October 11, 1915. 



GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 119 

taken to see him through the ordeal to which 
he was then subjected by his own people. 
The Treaty of Bucharest, which deprived 
Bulgaria of Kavalla and Salonica, left the 
wound to fester and Austro-Bulgarian friend- 
ship to harden into a definite alliance. None 
the less Bulgaria's friendship with the Central 
Empires was not openly manifested until the 
financial transaction was concluded between 
them which made Bulgaria the creditor of 
Austria-Hungary shortly before the outbreak 
of the war. 

Economically, Bulgaria, like her neighbours, 
had long been a tributary of the Central 
Empires. German and Austrian interests 
were cunningly intertwined with Bulgarian 
in almost every branch of national life. The 
banks, financial houses, export firms, are all 
under Austrian or German control. In the 
army, too, despite its Russian training and 
traditions, there was a party of officers whose 
admiration for the war-lord ran away with 
their discretion. And the celebrated loan of 
half a milliard francs, which Austrian financiers 
undertook to advance to Bulgaria — on out- 
rageously oppressive conditions — set the crown 
to the work of many years. This transaction 
was not intended by either party to be purely 
financial. Its political bearings were evidenced 
by the circumstances in which it was negotiated 
and the terms on which it was concluded. 
But the economic concessions insisted upon by 
Austria and conceded by Bulgaria constituted 
of themselves a convincing proof of the design 
to reduce the latter country to the position 
of one of the dependents of the Central 
Empires. 

Of all the recognized agencies for pene- 



120 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

trating international opinion, swaying inter- 
national sentiment, and influencing international 
action, one of the most abiding and decisive 
is that of royal courts. Yet its value was not 
merely underrated by Britain, France and 
Russia, but was completely ignored. And 
Germany, whose diplomacy, in spite of its 
clumsiness and brutality, was far-sighted and 
assiduous in watching for and utilizing every 
opportunity of smoothing the way for the 
execution of the grandiose plan, purveyed 
almost every court and throne in Europe with 
kings, queens and princesses of its own. And 
those who were neither Germans by birth nor 
connected with Germans by marriage were 
influenced by education, by military training, 
or at least by a system of atmosphering which, 
with certain striking examples before one, could 
be reduced to a few clear rules. 

Roumania at the opening of the war was 
governed by a Hohenzollern prince who had 
linked the destinies of his country with those 
of Austria-Hungary as far back as the year 
1880, and, having renewed the secret conven- 
tion in 1913, which for him was no mere scrap 
of paper, convoked a crown council in August 
1914 and proposed that Roumania should 
redeem his pledge and take the field against 
the enemies of the Central Empires. But 
King Carol's military ardour was not merely 
damped but choked by a recalcitrant cabinet. 

That monarch's influence as a pioneer of 
Teuton Kultur in Roumania can hardly be 
exaggerated. An upright ruler, who discharged 
his duties conscientiously, the King reckoned 
among these the dissipation of native gloom 
by means of German light. And during his 
long reign he succeeded in spreading a net- 



GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 121 

work of German economic interests throughout 
his realm which, while raising the material 
level of the nation, has reduced it to the 
position of a German tributary. It would be 
unjust to make this a subject of reproach to 
the monarch who acted up to his lights, but 
it would be a mistake to belittle the vast 
services thus rendered by a single individual 
to the Teuton race, or to overlook the degree 
of responsibility that attaches to the nations 
now banded together, and in especial to Russia, 
for the sequence of untoward phenomena 
which, now that they are not only seen, but 
felt, and felt painfully, we naively deplore. 

King Carol's successor is also a Hohenzollern 
prince whose attachment to his Prussian 
fatherland is noted, whose relations with his 
kinsman, the Kaiser, are cordial, but whose 
devotion to his subjects is paramount. More 
than once since the opening of the campaign 
Roumania was believed to be on the point 
of exchanging neutrality for belligerency, but, 
on grounds which it would be unfruitful to 
discuss, she abandoned the intention, if she 
ever harboured it. As matters now are, the 
Allies are congratulating themselves on the 
circumstance that she is still neutral. 

The Queen of Sweden is a daughter of the 
most imperialistic of German princes, the late 
Grand Duke of Baden and a cousin of the 
Kaiser, to whom she is attached by bonds of 
sympathy and admiration. And her consort 
the King, fascinated by the methods, the 
strivings, the achievements of the Hohen- 
zollerns, has made more than one attempt to 
imitate them, but, owing partly to the opposi- 
tion of the late Herr Staaff, and largely to 
his own mental and moral equipment, which 



122 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

point in a different direction, he felt obliged 
to desist. 

The accomplished Queen of the Belgians 
and the Tsaritsa of Russia are also both Ger- 
man princesses, but they form exceptions to 
the rule that whichever of any two spouses is 
German exercises an overmastering influence 
on the other. The Prince Consort of Holland, 
the Duke of Mecklenburg, is a German of the 
Germans, but through constitutional channels 
he can wield no political influence, and the 
attitude of the Dutch Government towards 
the Allies has been clear enough to need no 
elaborate exegesis. 

The King of Bulgaria is an ex-officer of the 
Austro-Hungarian army, whose pro-German 
work and its far-resonant results will probably 
never be wholly forgotten by his own German 
people. For, as we saw, it has rendered them 
services that cannot be repaid. Not, indeed, 
that he had any coherent plan in his mind's 
eye, or was guided by any deep-seated moral 
principles. Politics were for him the art of 
the possible enlarged by the negation of the 
ethical. Ferdinand may, therefore, be de- 
scribed as an opportunist, who in current 
politics contented himself with following his 
nose. Of treaties and conventions he had 
signed a goodly number and broken some. 
Thus with Russia he had a secret agreement of 
a military nature, and also with Russia's rival, 
Austria-Hungary. With Serbia he had one 
set of stipulations, with Turkey another, but, 
shifty customer that he is, he had set himself 
above them all and was ever ready to follow the 
lead of personal interest. What the historian 
will accentuate is the deftness with which Ger- 
man diplomacy, for all its alleged clumsiness, 



GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 123 

contrived to use his defects and his qualities 
alike for the furtherance of its own designs. 

Love of country, like religious faith, is a 
respectable mainspring of action. But Fer- 
dinand has been credited with neither. 
Whithersoever he moves one looks in vain 
for the guiding light of large ideas. Deeper 
than conscious volition lies the stored-up 
instinct of barren pettifogging egotism to 
which a fine moral atmosphere is deadly. 
Insincerity is second nature to him. He 
once boasted in my presence that he was a 
born actor, and it is fair to say that he played 
his roles — repellent for the most part — as 
behoves a mummer. The astonishing thing 
is that he should have got influential poli- 
ticians to take him seriously. While assuring 
the French deputy, M. Joseph Reinach, of his 
attachment to France and signing himself the 
European, he was writing to Professor Walter 
of Budapest offering " all the sympathies of 
the Bulgarian nation " to Hungary. 1 I have 
read ecstatic communications of his penned 
in hours of exaltation, when visions of Con- 
stantine's city, the mosque of Ay a Sofia 
towering aloft, warmed his fancy and the 
sheen of Byzantine brocades and the quaint 
paraphernalia of bygone days inspired his 
apocalyptic words. His language in those 
telegrams and letters was highfaluting and 
bombastic. And I read other communications 
of his — mostly abject appeals for help — devoid 
of dignity and manliness, when the gloom of 
dissipated illusions was made unbearable by 
fear of dethronement and death. And the 
figure cut by the Tsarlet, who addressed those 

1 In September 1914. See Morning Post, September 4, 
1914. 



124 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

humble prayers — mostly to influential ladies — 
was despicable. 

Ferdinand was swayed by ingrained hatred 
of Russia which was almost as potent as his 
contempt for the Bulgars. And he never 
made a secret of either. For the Turkish 
pasha who was responsible for the Bulgarian 
atrocities, which aroused Gladstone's indigna- 
tion, Ferdinand's professed admiration took 
the form of a subscription. 1 But high above 
all motives that turned upon his feelings 
towards others were those that centred 
entirely in himself. 

And he had cogent personal motives for 
cultivating cordial relations with the country 
of his birth. From the Austrian Government 
he expected to be saved from the necessity of 
abdicating and expiating his unwisdom. It 
was his inordinate ambition and vanity which 
had brought the Bulgarian nation to the very 
brink of ruin. He it was who had insisted on 
breaking off negotiations with Turkey during 
the London Conference and recommencing 
hostilities. In vain the Chief of the General 
Staff, Fitcheff, 2 besought him to conclude 
peace. The importunate military adviser was 

1 The Batak massacre of Bulgarians by order of Abdul 
Kerim Pasha had called forth Gladstone's pamphlet : 
Bulgarian Atrocities, and aroused the horror of civilized 
men. But the Hungarian aristocracy sympathized with 
the mass murderer, and presented him with a golden 
hilted sabre. The list of subscribers for this mark of 
aversion to the Bulgarian people can still be viewed in 
the Museum at Budapest. The third name on that list — 
Princess Clementine — is followed immediately by that of 
her son Prince Ferdinand of Coburg, who gave one hun- 
dred florins as a token of his admiration for the extermi- 
nator of his future subjects ! It need hardly be added 
that he was not yet Prince of Bulgaria. 

2 General Fitcheff has since become Minister of War. 



GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 125 

suddenly relieved of his duties and the second 
phase of the Balkan war begun. It was 
Ferdinand, too, who thwarted Russia's peace- 
making efforts, refused to send delegates to 
the tribunal of arbitration in Petrograd, and 
ordered the treacherous attack on the Serbs 
and the Greeks which culminated in Bulgaria's 
forfeiting some of the principal fruits of her 
heroic military exertions. 

For this series of baleful blunders — to the 
Bulgars they were nothing more — Ferdinand 
was known to be alone responsible. He had 
assumed the sole responsibility, and he had 
hoped to gather in the lion's share of the 
spoils. And as soon as responsibility seemed 
likely to involve punishment, his Ministers 
withdrew and exposed his person to the 
nation. When, after the end of the second 
Balkan war, General Savoff repaired to Con- 
stantinople to better the relations between 
Bulgaria and Turkey, he invited a number of 
French and British journalists who happened 
to be just then in the capital, and he addressed 
them as follows : "It has come to my ears that 
in Sofia I am accused of being the person who 
issued the order to our army to attack our 
Allies and that I am to be tried for it. They 
will never dare to prosecute me. For I have 
here — " and he thumped his side pocket as 
he spoke — " the order issued by the real author 
of the war and in his own handwriting. He 
commanded me orally to do this, but I replied 
that I must have a written order from the 
Government. Thereupon he shouted : c I am 
the supreme chief of the army and am about 
to give you the order in writing,' indited the 
behest and handed it to me. That is why he 
cannot prosecute me. I will show him up. 



126 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Already now I tell you, so that all may hear, 
Cest un coquin,. un miserable ! " 1 

That was General Savoff's summing-up of 
his august sovereign. And his forecast proved 
correct. Ferdinand did not attempt to lay 
the blame on him, still less to have an indict- 
ment filed against him. On the contrary, he 
kissed Savoff on his return to Sofia and later 
on made him his adjutant-general. Ferdi- 
nand's responsibility being established, his abdi- 
cation was clamoured for by public opinion. 
His own estimate of his plight was impreg- 
nated with despair. He despatched the abject 
telegrams mentioned above to his influential 
friends. It was then that he received a 
letter signed by the three chiefs of the 
Liberal groups of the old Stambulovist Party 
— Radoslavoff, Ghennadieff and Tontcheff— 
and written, it has been alleged, after con- 
sultation between all four parties, exhorting 
him to reverse the national policy and link 
Bulgaria's fate with that of Austria. The 
Coburg prince publicly welcomed them, dis- 
missed the Daneff Cabinet, handed the reins 
of power to the three self-constituted saviours 
of the dynasty and country, and the Treaty of 
Bucharest was signed in an offhand manner. 
The keynote of the policy of the new Cabinet 
was hatred of Russia, who was held up to 
public opprobrium by the press of Sofia as 
the mischief-maker who had betrayed Bulgaria ; 
and as the nation thirsted for a culprit on whom 
to vent its rage, the legend obtained a certain 
vogue. At the same time emphatic assurances 
were given by Count Berchtold that Austria 
would upset the Treaty of Bucharest, break 

1 This narrative was published by M. Wesselitsky in 
the Novoye Vremya, November 6, 1915. 



GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 127 

down the Serbian and Greek barriers that stood 
between Bulgaria and her natural boundaries, 
and establish Ferdinand and his dynasty more 
firmly on the throne. This prospect heartened 
the King and stimulated his fellow- workers. 

But perhaps the most decisive factor in 
Bulgaria's attitude towards the Central Powers 
has been that of Russia towards Bulgaria. 
The Tsardom cherishes tender feelings towards 
the political entity which it called into being. 
Bulgaria is the creature of the great Slav 
people which shed its blood and spent its 
treasure in giving it life and viability, and has 
ever since felt bound to watch over its destinies, 
forgive its foolish freaks, and contribute to its 
political and material well-being. Congruously 
with this frame of mind, Russia has not the 
heart to deal with Bulgaria as she would deal 
under similar provocation with Roumania or 
Greece. Like the baby cripple, or the pro- 
fligate son, this wayward little nation ever 
remains the spoiled child. Hence, do what 
harm she may to Russia, she is not merely 
immune from the natural consequences of her 
unfriendly acts, but certain to reap fruits 
ripened by the sacrifices of those whose policy 
she strove to baulk. Conscious of this im- 
mense privilege, she takes the fullest advantage 
of it. Under such conditions no stable coalition 
of the Balkan States was possible. 

The remarkable ascendancy thus won by 
Germany over Bulgaria is but one of the 
salient results of her foresight, organization 
and single-mindedness which the Allies are 
now beginning to appreciate. Their ideal policy 
in the Balkans was to have none. Great 
Britain in particular was proud of her complete 
disinterestedness. 



128 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Between the Teutons and the Greeks there 
were no such close ties as those that linked 
Bulgaria to the Central Empires. The Hellenic 
kingdom is a democracy marked by a constant 
tendency to anarchy. Down to the beginning 
of the reign of the present monarch its ruler 
was never more than the merest figure-head, 
nor its people anything but an amalgam of 
individuals deficient in the social sense and 
devoid of political cohesiveness. The late 
King George, for instance, remained, to the 
end of his life, an amused spectator of the 
childish game of politics carried on by his 
Ministers; and so insecure did he consider 
his tenure of the kingship, that his frequent 
threat to " take his hat " and quit the country 
for good had become one of the commonplaces 
of Greek politics. Only a few years ago his 
reign appeared to be drawing to an ignominious 
end. His functions were usurped by a military 
league and his sons removed from the army. 
Anarchy was spreading, at that time I ex- 
pressed the opinion that the only person 
capable of saving Greece — if Greece could yet 
be saved — was the Cretan insurgent, M. Veni- 
zelos. This suggestion appealed to the Chief 
of the Military League and was adopted. 
Venizelos was invited to Athens with the 
results known to all the world. At first 
reluctantly tolerated, he was subsequently 
highly appreciated by King George and was 
afterwards handicapped by King Constantine, 
whose impolitic instructions during the Bucha- 
rest Conference resulted in sowing seeds of 
discord between Greece and Bulgaria. 

To small countries and petty personal am- 
bitions, a war among the Great Powers brings 
halcyon days of flattery, bribery and seductive 



GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 129 

prospects in an imaginary future. In Greece 
all these and other attractions were dangled 
before the eyes of men of power and influence. 
The Sovereign, whose admiration for the Kaiser 
verges on idolatry, soon extended this platonic 
sentiment to the Kaiser's army. And when 
fortune seemed definitively to espouse the 
cause of the Central Empires, his admiration 
was reinforced by fear and the pro-German 
leanings, which were at first merely platonic, 
bade fair to harden into active co-operation. 
It was not until then that the Entente Powers, 
discerning the fateful character of their errors 
and the trend of events, resolved after much 
hesitation and discussion to put forth an 
effort to retrieve the situation. Of his philo- 
German tendencies King Constantine gave 
several public proofs long before the war, and 
on the psychological soil from which they 
sprang, German diplomacy raised its typical 
structure of intrigue and adulation. As the 
irresistible captain who had shattered the 
armies of Turkey and Bulgaria, winning un- 
dying fame for himself and his country, the 
King was encouraged to believe that on him 
devolved the mission of uniting all Hellenes 
under his sceptre, building up a larger Greece, 
consolidating the monarchy within, and ruling 
as well as reigning. And so well laid was this 
plan that when the European armies took the 
field and the Entente Powers counted Greece, 
then apparently governed by Venizelos, among 
its cordial friends, the Teutons, sure of their 
ground, but still working assiduously for their 
object, put their trust in the Kaiser's royal 
henchman and their own permanent display of 
force, and were not disappointed. 

Long before the war-cloud burst, the history 



130 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

makers of Berlin recognized the fact that the 
key to the Dardanelles lay in Sofia, and not 
only to the Dardanelles, but also the key to 
the Near East. The statesmen of Austria and 
Germany discerned that the Bulgars under 
their guidance could be got to do for Turkey 
what Japan hoped, and still hopes, to effect 
for China. It is a work of complete trans- 
formation, a sort of political transubstantia- 
tion whereby the Bulgars would infuse ichor 
into the limp veins of the Ottoman organism 
and recreate a strong political entity which 
would be an instrument in the hands of the 
Central Empires. The Bulgar knows the Turk, 
to whom he is more akin by race habits and 
temperament than to any of the Slav peoples, 
understands his psychic state, his mode of feeling 
and thinking, and is therefore qualified to serve 
as link between the Oriental and the Western. 
It was in view of this eventuality that the 
slow, plodding work of grafting Kultur on 
the Bulgar people was undertaken. Two 
German schools, one in Sofia and the other in 
Philippopolis, were the centres whence it was 
radiated to the ends of the land. In Bul- 
garia there are many preparatory grammar 
schools in which tuition for both sexes is free. 
All scholars who have passed through one of 
the German schools are admitted without any 
examination into the Grammar School, or 
Gymnasium, a privilege which works as a 
powerful attraction. Since Turkey retroceded 
Karagatch * to Bulgaria there are three such 
centres of Teutonic propaganda in Bulgaria, 
and I am informed that a fourth will shortly 
be established in Rustschuk. 

The record of the economic invasion of 
1 One of the suburbs of Adrianople ceded in July 1915. 



GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 131 

Roumania by the Teuton, 1 supplemented as 
it was by various complex auxiliary move- 
ments of a political character, supplies us 
with a fresh variation of the trite text that 
Germany conceived her plan on a vast scale 
and executed it by co-operation between the 
State and the individuals, leaving nothing to 
chance which could be settled by forethought. 
The ruler of the country was a Hohenzollern, 
and as he wielded absolute power in matters 
connected with foreign policy, he had a free 
hand and kept it efficaciously employed. For 
over thirty years King Carol transacted the 
international business of the realm — economic 
as well as political — with assiduity, conscien- 
tiousness and a fair meed of success. He en- 
couraged industry and commerce, and welcomed 
German and Austrian capital and enterprise. 
The upshot of his exertions was that in 
the fullness of time his kingdom, like those 
of Italy, Bulgaria and Turkejr, became to 
most intents a nascent Teutonic colony. In 
Roumania, as in Bulgaria, the commercial 
methods and business ways are German. The 
heads of banking establishments and great 
industries are either Teutons or friends of 
Teutons. Nearly every big enterprise, com- 
mercial and industrial, was launched and kept 
afloat by capital from the Fatherland. The 
Discount Bank in Berlin has a vast cellar filled 
with Roumanian bonds, shares and other 
securities. So close are the ties that connect 
the little state with the great empire that even 

1 Roumania's annual imports from Austria-Hungary, 
according to the latest available statistics, were valued 
at 136,906,000 francs; from Germany at 183,713,000; 
and from Great Britain at only 85,470,000 francs. France 
exported thither goods valued at no more than 35,273,000 
francs. 



132 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

the Roumanian railways have a special con- 
vention with those of Prussia. Here, then, as 
everywhere else, we are in presence of intelli- 
gence wedded to politico-economic enterprise. 
Individual German firms and the Government 
worked hand in hand; diplomacy, trade and 
commerce moved steadily towards the same 
goal, and attained it. 

Owing to Roumania's grievances against 
Russia — whose seizure of Bessarabia nearly 
forty years ago left a wound which festered for 
years and has only recently been cicatrized — 
King Carol concluded a military convention 
with the Austro-Hungarian empire, the stipu- 
lations of which have never been authori- 
tatively disclosed. There is reason to believe 
that one clause obliged the Roumanian Govern- 
ment to come to the support of the Habsburg 
Monarchy with all its military resources in 
case that empire should be wantonly attacked 
by another Power. Whether this instrument, 
which was never laid before the Roumanian 
legislature for ratification, is deemed to have 
been vitiated by the lack of this indispensable 
sanction, or is assumed to have terminated 
with the decease of the king who concluded 
it, is a matter of no real moment. The 
relevant circumstance is the unwillingness of 
Austria-Hungary to invoke the terms of the 
convention and the resolve of the Bucharest 
Cabinet to ignore them. 

Thus Roumania, like all other neutral states, 
was well within the sphere of attraction of the 
Central Empires long before the present con- 
flict was unchained. And the clever tactics 
by which siege was laid to the sympathies of 
a nation which at bottom has hardly any 
traits in common with the besieger, would 



GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 133 

have entailed a complete revision and remodel- 
ling of the polity of Russia, France and Britain, 
had these Powers had any coherent programme 
or distant aims. But their motto was : Suffi- 
cient unto the day is the evil thereof. 

True, none of those States ever designed a 
political revolution of the Old Continent, such 
as Napoleon had imagined or Germany is now 
striving to realize. But neither did they read 
aright nor even give serious thought to the 
symptoms of the great conspiracy which was 
being hatched by others for that purpose. 
Busied with their party squabbles and social 
reforms, they took it for granted that inter- 
national tranquillity which was a condition of 
the stability of all internal affairs was assured. 
Such occasional misunderstandings as might 
crop up among the Powers could, they imagined, 
always be smoothed over by manifestations of 
goodwill and timely concessions. Fitfulness and 
hesitancy marked every attempt made by Ger- 
many's rivals to push their trade or extend their 
political relations beyond their own borders. 

This lack of enterprise was especially accen- 
tuated in their dealings with Turkey. No 
Powers had done so much to uphold Ottoman 
sway in Europe as France and Britain, and for 
a long while their exertions found their natural 
outcome in a degree of influence at the Sub- 
lime Porte which was unparalleled in Turkish 
history. But once Germany inaugurated her 
economico-political campaign in the Near East, 
the principle of neighbourliness was invoked in 
favour of allowing her to possess herself of a 
share of the good things going, whereupon 
Great Britain, and in a lesser degree France, 
curbed their natural impulse and left most of 
the field to the pushing new-comer. For years 



134 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

the writer of these lines pointed out the danger 
of this self-abnegation, but his insistent appeals 
for a more active line of conduct were met 
by the statement that Near Eastern affairs 
had long ceased to tempt the enterprise or 
affect the international policy of Great Britain. 
As though Great Britain were not a member 
of the European community or her geographical 
insularity implied political isolation; or as if 
her policy of equilibrium were capable of being 
achieved without the employment of adequate 
means ! When I raised my voice against our 
participation in the Baghdad railway scheme 
and bared to the light the political designs 
underlying it, Cabinet Ministers assured the 
country that its scope was exclusively economic 
and cultural and had no connection with 
politics ! This naive belief and the laissez- 
faire attitude which it engendered enabled the 
Teutons to reduce Turkey to economic and 
political thraldom and to earmark Asia Minor, 
thenceforward hedged in with the Baghdad and 
Anatolian railways, as a future German colony. 
The closeness and constancy of the relations 
between economics and politics which easily 
took root in German consciousness, had for 
another of its corollaries the dispatch of General 
Liman von Sanders and his band of officers to 
reorganize the Ottoman army. This measure 
struck some observers as the beginning of the 
end of European peace. It was thus that the 
Russian Premier, Kokofftseff, and his colleague, 
Sazonoff, construed it, and that was the inter- 
pretation which I also put upon it. But none 
of the other interested Governments expressed 
similar misgivings, nor, so far as one can judge, 
entertained any. Yet when war was finally 
declared, Germany's plan of campaign allotted an 



GERMANY AND THE BALKANS 135 

important role to Turkey not in a possible emer- 
gency, but at a date to be determined by the 
completion of her military and naval equipment. 
In this ingenious and comprehensive way, 
operating at a multitude of points, but never 
dissociating economics from politics, never 
abandoning the work of commercial expansion 
to the unaided resources of individuals, the 
Teutonic empires contrived to spread a huge 
net in whose meshes almost every civilized 
nation was to some extent entangled. And the 
subsequent political conduct of many of these 
was determined in advance by the plight to 
which they had been thus reduced. Russia was 
reasonably believed to be incapable of taking 
the field ; Italy was accounted wholly unfitted 
to bear the weight of the financial burden 
which a conflict with Germany would lay upon 
her shoulders; Roumania, it was calculated, 
would decline to exchange material gains for 
political returns purchased at a heavy cost; 
Bulgaria could not afford to estrange Austria's 
sympathies and need never fear that she 
might forfeit those of Russia; Sweden, satur- 
ated with German Kultur, was one of the 
foreposts of Teutonism in the north of Europe 
and might in time be induced to imitate 
Bulgaria and play for the hegemony of the 
Scandinavian States with the Kaiser's help; 
Switzerland was virtually German in every- 
thing but political organization; Holland 
would believe in Prussianism and tremble; 
Belgium was economically a pawn in German 
hands and Antwerp a German port; and 
in the United States millions of hyphenated 
Germans would plead the Teuton cause and 
do the rough work of advancing it by means 
of their political organization and influence. 



CHAPTER XI 

THE RIVAL POLICIES 

In face of this Teutonic control of the 
world's trade, politics and news supply, the 
Great Powers whose outlook, political and 
economic, was most nearly affected, exhibited 
a degree of supineness which can only be 
adequately explained by such assumptions as 
one would gladly eliminate. Anyhow the 
lessons conveyed by eloquent facts fell upon 
deaf ears. Yet it was manifest, in view of 
Germany's ingenious combination of economics 
and politics, and the irresistible co-operation 
of the State and individuals in applying it, 
that the slipshod methods of Britain and 
France could no longer be persisted in without 
grave danger to these states. To deal with 
trade and industry as though they were matters 
that concerned only the particular business 
firms engaged in them was no longer an eco- 
nomical error, it was also a political blunder. 
To Government meddling in trade and industry 
the British people have ever been averse. And 
their dislike is intelligible although no longer 
warranted. A glance at Germany's economic 
campaign and its results ought to have borne 
out the thesis that individual self-reliance and 
push are unavailing to cope with a potent 
organism equipped scientifically, provided with 
large capital and backed by the resources of 
diplomacy. New epochs call for fresh methods, 

136 



THE RIVAL POLICIES 137 

and the era of commercial and industrial 
individualism was closed years ago by the 
German people. Co-ordination of effort, the 
combination of politics with economics, and 
unity of direction were among Germany's 
methods in the contest, and she adopted them 
in the grounded belief that commerce and 
industry lie at the nethermost roots of the 
vast political movements of the new era. 

This is a century of co-operation, of joint 
efforts for common interests, of union in 
trade, industry, labour, politics and war. To 
stand aloof is to be isolated, and isolation 
means helplessness against danger. Germany 
was the first Power to grasp these facts, to 
understand the new phase of life and to adapt 
herself to it. For this work of readjustment 
her people were specially endowed by Nature, 
and in their equipment for the task they saw 
a mark of election set upon them by their 
" old God." For the correlate of co-opera- 
tion is talent for organization, and with this 
the Teutons are plentifully gifted. They feel 
impelled as it were by instinct to push for- 
ward much further on the road already 
traversed by all nations from isolation to 
individualism through gregariousness. They 
opened the new era of amalgamation by co- 
ordinating, on a vast scale, individual achieve- 
ments, resources and labour, and directing 
them to a common end. The allied peoples 
were meanwhile content to muddle through 
in the old way. This difference explains much 
that seems puzzling in the outcome of the 
struggle. 

It has been affirmed somewhat off-handedly 
that the Latin and British peoples, incapable 
of united and organized effort, have halted at 



138 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

the individualist stage. They are supposed 
to lack the bump of organization. According 
to this theory among the Germans, who had 
passed through all the intermediate phases 
and carried individualism to sinister extremes 
in the past, a reaction set in which called forth 
the latent powers of organization which they 
possess. And these have been wielded with 
brilliant results ever since the unity of the 
German Empire was first established. Apply- 
ing the new principle to politics, the statesmen 
of Berlin grasped the fact that all future 
conflicts in Europe would be waged by coali- 
tions. Neither Austria-Hungary alone nor the 
German Empire alone could undertake a world 
war. That was the genesis of the scheme of 
welding the two central empires in one politico- 
military entity and then attracting as many 
other States as possible into their orbit. And 
the enterprise was conducted so ingeniously 
that when war was declared, Roumania, Bul- 
garia and Turkey were tied to the Triple 
Alliance. And henceforward, whatever the 
outcome of the war may be, the permanent 
fusion of Germany and Austria is a foregone 
conclusion. 

By the means described a state of things, 
actual and potential, was established which 
rendered Germany's military attack on Europe 
much less hazardous and doubtful a venture 
than was at first supposed. For there was 
not a country on the globe which she or her 
ally had not subjected to the process of inter- 
penetration, nor was there one which had 
remained wholly irresponsive. Even Brazil, 
Chili, Peru, China, Morocco, Persia, Abys- 
sinia, had all experienced its effects. And 
when at last the harvest-time was come and 



THE RIVAL POLICIES 139 

its fruits were to be ingathered Germany felt 
that she could count to varying extents on 
the active sympathy and support of govern- 
ments, parliaments and nations ; on the Turks, 
the Swiss, the Swedes, the Bulgarians, the 
Roumanians; on the autocratic ruler of the 
Greeks and on millions of American-Germans. 
Every independent religious centre was per- 
meated with an atmosphere composed in 
Germany. The Caliph and the Sheikh-ul- 
Islam of the Moslems, the evangelical preachers 
of the Russian Baltic provinces, Brahmins in 
India, subjects of the Negus of Abyssinia, the 
Jews of western Russia and Poland, as well 
as those of the Netherlands, the Catholics of 
Switzerland, Holland and Italy, nay, the 
Vatican itself, raised their voices in the chorus 
of the millions who sang hosannah to the 
Highest. 1 

Dismay was the feeling aroused among the 
Allies by the quick dramatic moves which 
precipitated the war. The trump of doom 
seemed to have sounded at a moment when 
mankind was on the point of discovering the 
secret of immortality. The utter unprepared- 
ness of the Allies was the dominant note of 
the new situation, and its manifestations were 
countless and disastrous. There was no ade- 
quate British expeditionary army to send on 
foreign service, and there existed no machinery 
by which such a force could quickly be got 
together and trained. Voluntary enlistment 
was a slowly moving mechanism, and even if 
it could be made to work more rapidly, there 
was no way of employing the new soldiers, 
for whom there were neither barracks nor 

1 The Highest of All is the official designation of the 
Kaiser : der Allerhochste. 



140 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

uniforms nor rifles in sufficiency. And if all 
these requirements could have been impro- 
vised, there were no generals accustomed to 
handle armies of millions. And even if all 
those wants had been supplied to hand 
there was no Government enterprising enough 
to put them to the best advantage of the 
nation. Moreover, colonial expeditions were 
the most extensive military operations which 
the country had carried on within the memory 
of the present generation, and it was beyond 
the power of the authorities not only to 
organize the imperial defences on an adequate 
scale but even to realize the necessity of 
attempting the feat. In a word, the prospect 
could hardly have been more dismal. 

In France it was a degree less cheerless, but 
still decidedly bleak. Mobilization there went 
forward, it is claimed, more smoothly than 
had been anticipated, but not rapidly enough 
to enable adequate forces to be dispatched 
in time against the German military flood. 
The organization of the railway system was 
most inefficient. And had it not been for 
heroic Belgium, who, confronted with the 
alternatives of ruin with honour and safety 
with ignominy, unhesitatingly chose the better 
part, the inrush of the Teutons would, it is 
asserted by military experts, have swept away 
every obstacle that lay between them and the 
French capital, which was their first objective. 
Belgium's magnificent resistance thus saved 
Paris, gave breathing space to the French, 
and enabled the Allies to swing their sword 
before smiting. 

Russia, too, did better than had been augured 
of her, but not nearly as well as if her resources 
had been organized by competent experts, 



THE RIVAL POLICIES 141 

alive to the dangers that threatened the 
empire. On the eve of the war a process of 
fermentation among the working men of her 
two capitals was coming to a head, and a 
revolt, if not a revolution, was being indus- 
triously organized. The movement had cer- 
tainly been fostered, and probably originated, 
by wealthy German employers in Petrograd, 
Moscow and other industrial centres. They 
had hoped to frustrate the mobilization order, 
retard Russia's entry into the field, and possibly 
bring about civil strife. And they were within 
an ace of succeeding. On the very eve of 
hostilities reports reached Berlin and Vienna 
that the revolution was already beginning. 
But the declaration of war against Germany 
purified the air, absorbed the redundant ener- 
gies of the people, and fused all classes and 
parties into a whole-hearted, single-minded 
nation, giving Russia a degree of union which 
she had not enjoyed since Napoleon's in- 
vasion. But, separated from her allies, she 
went her own way without much reference to 
theirs. Her plans had been drafted by her 
military leaders, and might be modified by 
local conditions or subsequent vicissitudes, 
but were neither co-ordinated nor even syn- 
chronized with those of France and Britain. 
Thus the first and most important lesson had 
still to be mastered. 

Liege and Namur having fallen, the danger 
to Paris struck terror to the hearts of the 
French, and the public mind was being 
gradually prepared by the Press to receive the 
depressing tidings of its capture with digni- 
fied calm. The occupation of the capital, it 
was argued, would not essentially weaken 
the military strength of the Republic. For the 



142 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

army would still be intact, and that was the 
essential point. Here, for the first time, one 
notes the almost invincible force of the anti- 
quated opinions to which the Allies still 
tenaciously clung about warfare as modified 
by Germany. No misgivings were harboured 
that the enemy might threaten to burn the 
capital city if the army refused to capitulate, 
or that he was capable of carrying out such a 
threat. War in its old guise, hedged round 
with traditions of chivalry, with humanitarian 
restrictions, with international laws, was how 
the French and their allies conceived it. And 
it was in that spirit that they made their 
forecasts and regulated their own behaviour 
towards the enemy. 

The rise of Generals Joffre, Castelnau and 
Foch and the retreat of the German invaders 
raised the Allies from the depths of despair 
to a degree of confidence bordering on pre- 
sumption. After the departure of the Belgian 
Government to Antwerp, 1 the occupation of 
Brussels, 2 the defeat of the Austrian army by 
the Serbs and the rout of three German army 
corps by the Russians, 3 the Western Allies 
conceived high hopes of the military prowess 
of the Slavs, and looked to them for the de- 
cisive action which would speedily bring the 
Teutons to their knees. And for a time 
Russia's continued progress seemed to justify 
these hopes. Her troops entered Insterburg 4 
and pushed on to Konigsberg, which they 
invested and threatened, 5 and in the south 
they scored a series of remarkable successes 
in Galicia. But in the west of Europe the 

1 August 17, 1914. 2 August 20, 1914. 

3 August 22, 1914. 4 August 23, 1914. 

6 August 29, 1914. 






THE RIVAL POLICIES 143 

Allies could at most but retard without 
arresting the advance of the Germans, whose 
aim was to defeat the French and then con- 
centrate all their efforts on the invasion of the 
Tsardom. Despite assurances of an optimistic 
tenor there appeared to be no serious hope 
of defending Paris, nor were effective local 
measures adopted for the purpose; and on 
September 3 the French Government, against 
the insistent advice of three experienced 
Cabinet Ministers, suddenly moved to Bor- 
deaux, and earned for itself the nickname of 
tournedos a la bordelaise. On the same historic 
day the Tsar's troops triumphantly entered 
Lemberg, restored to that city its ancient 
name of Lvoff, and proceeded to introduce 
the Russian system of administration there 
with all its traditional characteristics. But 
in lieu of conferring full powers on the 
Governor of the conquered province, a man 
of broad views and conciliatory methods, 
the Government dispatched a narrow-minded 
official, devoid of natural ability, of adminis- 
trative training, and of the sobering conscious- 
ness of his own defects, and listened to his 
recommendations. For Russia, like France 
and Britain, still contemplated the situation 
and its potentialities through the distorting 
medium of the old order of things. Their 
orientation had undergone no change. 

One of the immediate consequences of 
Russian rule in Galicia was to confirm the 
Vatican in its belief that Austria offered 
Catholicism far more trustworthy guarantees 
for its unhindered growth than could ever be 
expected from the Tsardom. 

The famous, battle of the Marne x infused 
1 September 12, 1914. 



144 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

new energies into the Allies, whose Press 
organs forthwith took to discussing the terms 
on which peace might be vouchsafed to the 
Teutons, and in these stipulations a spirit of 
magnanimity was displayed towards the enemy 
which at any rate served to show how little 
his temper was understood and how enor- 
mously his resources were underrated. Soon, 
however, the mist of ignorance began to lift, 
and saner notions of the stern interplay of 
the tidal forces at work were borne in upon 
the leaders of the allied peoples. One of 
the first discoveries to be made was the enor- 
mous consumption of ammunition required by 
latter-day warfare and the ease with which 
the Germans were able to meet this increased 
demand. That this enormous advantage was 
the result of scientific organization was patent 
to all. Nor could it be ignored that an essential 
element of that organization was the mili- 
tarization of all workmen whose services were 
needed by the State. But from the lesson 
thus inculcated to its application in practice 
there was an abyss. And as yet that abyss 
has not been bridged. The most formidable 
obstacle in the way is offered by the shackles 
of party politics, which still hamper the leaders 
of the Entente Powers, and in particular of 
Great Britain. Industrial compulsion has not 
yet been moved into the field of practical 
politics. 

One of Germany's calculations was that, 
however superior to her own resources those 
of her adversaries might be, they were not 
likely to be mobilized, concentrated and 
brought to bear upon the front. Consequently 
they would not tell upon the result. Military 
discipline had not impregnated any of the 



THE RIVAL POLICIES 145 

allied nations, whose ideas of personal liberty 
and dignity would oppose an insurmountable 
obstacle to that severe discipline which was 
essential to military success. Great Britain, 
they believed, would cling to her ingrained 
notions of the indefeasible right of the British 
workman to strike and of the British citizen 
to hold back from military service. And the 
telegrams announcing that in the United 
Kingdom the cries of " business as usual," 
" sport as usual," " strikes as usual," " volun- 
tary enlistment as usual," indicated the sur- 
vival of the antiquated spirit of individualism 
into a new order of things which peremptorily 
called for co-operation and iron discipline, 
were received in Berlin and Vienna with 
undisguised joy. The persistence of this spirit 
has been the curse of the Allies ever since. 



CHAPTER XII 

PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP 

It is worth noting in this connection how 
heavily the lack of genial leaders at this critical 
conjuncture in European history told upon 
the allied peoples and affected their chances 
of success. The statesmen in power were 
mostly straightforward, conscientious servants 
of their respective Governments, whose ideal 
had been the prevention of hostilities, and 
whose exertions in war time were directed to 
the restoration of peace on a stable basis. 
By none of them was the stir, the spirit, the 
governing instincts of the new era or the 
actual crisis perceived. They all failed of 
audacity. Hence they were solicitous to leave 
as far as possible intact all the rights, privi- 
leges and institutions of the past which would 
be serviceable in the re-established peace 
regime of the future. In Great Britain the 
voluntary system of recruiting the army and 
navy was to be respected, the right of work- 
men to strike was recognized, and the main- 
tenance of party government was looked upon 
as a matter of course. The writer of these pages 
made several ineffectual attempts to propagate 
the view that a War Cabinet presided over by 
a real chief was a corollary of the situation, 
military and industrial compulsion for all was 
indispensable, that a discriminating tariff on 
our imports and a restriction of certain exports 

146 



PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP 147 

would materially contribute to our progress, and 
that a special department for the manufacture 
of munitions ought to be organized without 
delay. 1 One measure indicative, people said, 
of undisputed wisdom which was resorted to 
was the appointment of Lord Kitchener as 
Secretary for War. 2 If this step deserved the 
fervent approval it met with, its efficacy was 
considerably impaired by imposing on the new 
Secretary the task of purveying munitions and 
other supplies, in addition to the multifarious 
duties of his office. And with this solitary 
exception everything was allowed to go on 
" as usual," with consequences which every 
one has since had an opportunity of medi- 
tating. Internal whole-hearted co-operation 
between the Government and all the social 
layers of the population was neither known 
nor systematically attempted, and still less 
were the respective forces of the Allies co- 
ordinated and hurled against the enemy. The 
struggle was confined to the army and the 
navy, and these instruments of national de- 
fence were inadequately provided with the 
first necessaries for action. 

Each of the Allies was isolated, cooped 
within its own narrow circle of ideas, buoyed 
up by its own hopes, bent on the attainment 
of its own special aims. The first step towards 
amalgamation was negative in character, but 
superlatively politic. It took the form of a 
covenant by which it was stipulated that none 
of the Allies should conclude a separate peace 

1 Cf. Contemporary Review, November 1914. I was 
requested to suppress an article on the subject of " Coali- 
tion Government " and another on the subject of " Tariff 
Reform during and after the War." 

2 August 5, 1914. 



148 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

with the enemy. But beyond that nothing 
was done, nor was anything more considered 
necessary. 

In Britain the consciousness that the country 
was at war spread very slowly, while the con- 
viction that this was a life-and-death struggle 
which would seriously affect the lives and 
rights and habits of every individual made no 
headway. Only a few grasped the fact that 
a tremendous upheaval was going forward 
which marked the rise of a new era and a 
complete break with the old. By the bulk 
of the population it was treated as a game 
calling for no extraordinary efforts, no special 
methods, no new departures. It was con- 
strued as a hateful parenthesis in a cheerful 
history of human progress, and the object of 
the nation was to have it swiftly and decently 
closed. Hence the machinery of the old system 
was not discarded. Voluntary enlistment was 
belauded and agitation against joining the 
army magnanimously tolerated. Attacks on 
the Government were permitted. The manu- 
facture of munitions was confided to private 
firms and to the whims of dissatisfied work- 
men, and co-operation among the various 
sections of the population was left to private 
initiative. 

Most of us are prone to consider this war 
as a fortuitous event, which might, indeed, 
have been staved off, but which, having dis- 
turbed for a time the easy movement of our 
insular life, will die away and leave us free to 
continue our progress on the same lines as 
before. But this faith is hardly more than 
the confluence of hopes and strivings, habits, 
traditions, and aspirations untempered by 
accurate knowledge of the facts. And the 



PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP 149 

facts, were we cognizant of them, would show 
us that the agencies which brought about 
this tremendous shock of peoples without blast- 
ing our hopes or exploding our pet theories, 
will not spend their force in this generation 
or the next, and that already the entire fabric 
— social, political, and economical — of our 
national life is undergoing disruption. 

The shifting of landmarks, political and 
social, is going steadily if stealthily forward; 
and the nation waking up one day will note 
with amazement the vast distance it has im- 
perceptibly traversed. If only we could realize 
at present how rapidly and irrevocably we are 
drifting away from our old-world moorings, 
we should feel in a more congenial mood for 
adjusting ourselves to the new and unpopular 
requirements of the era now dawning. Already 
we are becoming a militarist and a protective 
State, but we do not yet know it. We have 
broken with the traditions of our own peculiar 
and insular form of civilization, of which 
poets like Tennyson were the high priests, 
yet we hesitate to bid them farewell. We 
still base our forecasts of the future political 
life on the past and calculate the outcome of 
the next elections, the fate of Disestablishment 
and Home Rule, the relative positions of the 
chief Parliamentary parties on the old bases, 
and draw up our plans accordingly. In short, 
we still bear about with us the fragrant atmo- 
sphere of our previous existence which will 
never be renewed. And it is owing to the 
effects of that disturbing medium that our 
observations have been so defective and our 
mistakes so sinister. We still fail to perceive 
that decay has overtaken the organs of our 
Party Government and the groundwork of our 



150 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

State fabric is rotten. Yet everything about 
and around us is in flux. We are in the midst 
of a new environment. 

When this war is over we shall search in 
vain for what was peculiarly British in our 
cherished civilization. Of that civilization 
which reached its acme during the reign of 
the late King Edward, we have seen the last, 
little though most of us realize its passing. 
It was an age of sturdy good sense, healthy 
animalism, and dignity withal, and not devoid 
of a strong flavour of humanity and home- 
reared virtue. But in every branch of politics 
and some departments of science it was an age 
of amateurism. Respect for right, for liberty, 
for law and tradition, for relative truth and 
gradual progress, was widely diffused. Well- 
controlled energy, responsiveness to calls on 
one's fellow-feeling, and the every-day honesty 
that tapers into policy were among its familiar 
features. But if one were asked to sum it all 
up in a single word it would be hard to utter 
one more comprehensive or characteristic than 
the essentially English term, comfort. Com- 
fort was the apex of the pyramid which is now 
crumbling away. And it is that Laodicean 
civilization, and not the fierce spirit of the new 
time, which is incarnate in the present official 
leaders of the British nation. 

The French, too, approached the general 
problem from their own particular standpoint. 
Provided with a serviceable military organiza- 
tion, the same unconsciousness of the need of 
mobilizing all the other national resources 
pierced through their policy. Parties and 
factions subsisted as before, and half-way 
men who would have been satisfied with 
driving the enemy out of France and Belgium 



PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP 151 

lifted up their voices against those who in- 
sisted on prosecuting the war until Prussian- 
ism was worsted. The French Socialists met 
in London x and passed resolutions in which 
the usual claptrap of the war of classes, the 
boons of pacifism and the wickedness of the 
Tsardom occupied a prominent place. And 
the Congress was honoured by the presence 
of two Cabinet Ministers, MM. Guesde and 
Sembat. 

Russia, true to her old self, carried the 
narrow spirit of the bureaucracy into the 
fiercest struggle recorded by history, seem- 
ingly satisfied that the clash of armies and 
navies would leave antiquated theories and 
moulding traditions intact. When the revolu- 
tionist Burtzeff published his patriotic letter to 
the French papers approving Russia's energetic 
defence of civilization, he was applauded by 
all Europe. " Even we," he wrote, " adhe- 
rents of the parties of the Extreme Left and 
hitherto ardent anti-militarists and pacifists, 
even we believe in the necessity of this war. 
The German peril, the curse which has hung 
over the world for so many decades, will be 
crushed." Yet when he returned to his 
country resolved to support the Tsar's Govern- 
ment and lend a hand in the good work, he 
was sent to Siberia, in commemoration of the 
old order of things. 

Germany alone took her stand on the new 
plane and accommodated herself to the new 
conditions. Thoroughness was her watchword 
because victory was her aim, its alternative 
being coma or death. With her gaze fixed on 
the end, she rejected nothing that could serve 
as means. 

1 February 1915. 



152 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

In congruity with these divergent views 
and sentiments was the reading of the war's 
vicissitudes in the various belligerent coun- 
tries. The allied Press was over-hopeful, 
right being certain to triumph over might 
wedded to wrong. Publicists pitied the 
Teutons in anticipation of the fate that was 
fast overtaking them. Paeans of victory re- 
sounded, allaying the apprehensions and numb- 
ing the energies of the leagued nations. The 
German, it was asseverated, had shot his bolt 
and was at bay. Russia had laid siege to 
Cracow, and would shortly occupy that city 
as she had occupied Lemberg. The Tsar's 
troops might then be expected to push on to 
Berlin, and to reach it in a few months. And, 
painfully aware of the certainty of this con- 
summation, Austria was dejected and Hungary 
secretly making ready to secede from the 
Habsburg Monarchy. To this soothing gossip 
even serious statesmen lent a willing ear. The 
writer of these remarks was several times 
asked by leading personages of the allied 
Governments whether internal upheavals were 
not impending in Germany and Austria, and 
his assurance that no such diversion could be 
looked for then or in the near future was 
traversed on the ground that all trustworthy 
accounts from Berlin, Vienna and Budapest 
pointed to a process of fermentation which 
would shortly interpose an impassable barrier 
to the further military advance of the Central 
empires. But he continued to express himself 
in the same strain of warning, which subse- 
quent events have unhappily justified. 

In October 1914, for instance, he wrote — 

" Germany has already shot her bolt, people 



PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP 153 

tell us. Already? The people who for forty 
years have been preparing to establish their 
rule from Ostend to the Persian Gulf have 
expended their energies after three months of 
warfare ? And the concrete foundations built 
at such pains and expense in the German 
factory that dominates Edinburgh? Was the 
Teuton simple-minded enough to fancy that 
he would be in a position to utilize this and 
the other emplacements for his giant guns 
within three months after the outbreak of 
hostilities ? Let us be fair to our enemy and 
just to ourselves. The German has not shot 
his bolt. If time is on our side, it will also 
remain on his up to a point which we have 
not yet reached. Those who urge that the 
German must make haste imply that his re- 
sources are gradually drying up, and that 
neither his food supplies, nor his chemicals, 
nor his metals can be imported so long as we 
hold command of the seas. His armies will 
therefore die of inanition, or their operations 
will be thwarted for lack of munitions. This 
would indeed be joyful tidings were it true. 
If false, it is a mischievous delusion. 

" We are told that the German time-table 
has been upset. Unquestionably it has. But 
is the time-table identical with the programme 
for which it was drawn up ? If it is, then the 
march on Paris has been definitely abandoned. 
Now is this conclusion borne out by what we 
behold ? What, then, is the meaning of the 
plan to capture Belfort and Calais? What is 
the object of the vast reinforcements now on 
their way from the east to Von Kluck's army ? 
Personally, I have not a doubt that Paris is 
the objective, or that the Germans are still 
striving to carry out their programme in its 



154 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

entirety, which is the extension of their empire 
over Europe and Asia Minor. The immediate 
object of the Allies is to foil this design, and 
only after we have accomplished that can we 
think of assuming the offensive and crushing 
Prussian militarism. We have not compassed 
that end ; the battlefields are still in the Allies' 
countries, and the initiative rests with the 
enemy. Now to whatever causes we may 
attribute this undesirable state of things — and 
it certainly cannot be ascribed to lack of 
energy on the part of the British Government 
or our military authorities — it is right that 
those who are acting for the nation should 
ask themselves whether those causes are still 
operative. If they are — and on this score 
there is hardly room for doubt — it behoves 
the Allies, and the British people in particular, 
to rise to a just sense of the unparalleled sacri- 
fices they must be prepared to make during 
the ordeal which they are about to undergo." 

The German way of looking at the relative 
strength and positions of the belligerents as 
modified by the vicissitudes of the campaign 
was realistic and statesmanlike. Starting from 
the principle that a people of about a hundred 
millions, animated by a lively faith in its own 
vitality and mental equipment, can neither 
be destroyed nor permanently crippled, they 
argued that the worst that Fate could have 
in store for them would be a draw. But before 
that end could be achieved the Teutonic 
armies must have been pulverized and Ger- 
many and Austria occupied by the allied 
troops. And of this there were no signs. 
" We never fancied," they said, " that what 
happened in 1870 would be repeated in 1914. 



PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP 155 

How could we make such a stupid mistake ? 
Then we had only France against us. To-day 
we encounter the combined forces of Russia, 
France, Belgium and England. This differ- 
ence had to have its counterpart in the cam- 
paign. Thus we have not yet captured Paris. 
But then to-day we are wrestling with the 
greatest empires in the world, and we hold 
them in our grip. We are fighting not for a 
few milliard francs and a disaffected province, 
but for priceless spoils and European hege- 
mony. Moreover, Belgium, which we possess 
and mean to keep, is a greater prize than the 
temporary occupation of Paris. Besides, post- 
ponement is not abandonment. Whether we 
take the French capital one month or another 
is but a detail. 

" And, over and above all this, we have 
reached the sea and are within a few miles of 
England's shores. Furthermore, Russia's army, 
which we lured into East Prussia until it 
fancied it was about to invest Konigsberg, 
has been driven back beyond Wirballen far 
into Tsardom, with appalling losses of men 
and material. Her other forces, which several 
weeks ago boasted that they were about to 
capture Cracow, will soon be driven out of 
Przemysl and Lemberg. Libau will fall into 
our hands. Riga is sure to be ours, and War- 
saw itself will finally admit our victorious 
troops. Does this look like defeat at the hands 
of our enemies? And German soil is still as 
immune from invasion as though it were girded 
by the sea." 

In all our forecasts one important element of 
calculation was invariably left out of account : 
the consequences of our blunders, past, present 
and future. And these have added enormously 



156 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

to our difficulties and dangers. Not the least 
made was the mistake in allowing the two 
German warships Goeben and Breslau to enter 
the Dardanelles. To have pursued them into 
Ottoman waters would, it was pleaded in 
justification, have constituted a violation of 
Turkish neutrality. Undoubtedly it would, 
but the infringement would not have been 
more serious than many flagrant breaches of 
neutrality which the Sublime Porte had com- 
mitted a short time before and was known to 
be about to perpetrate again. 1 But a scrupu- 
lous regard for the rights of neutrals has been, 
and still is, the groundstone of the Allies' 
policy, irrespective of its effects on the out- 
come of the war. The rules of the game, it 
is contended, must be observed by us, how- 
ever much they may be disregarded by the 
enemy. This considerateness and scrupulosity 
may be chivalrous, but they form an irksome 
drag on a nation at war with Teutons. The two 
ships were at once transferred by Germany to 
the Turks. 2 Some two months later, deeming 
their war preparations completed, the latter 
suddenly bombarded the open Russian town of 
Theodosia in the Black Sea, and sank several 
small craft, thus realizing Germany's hopes 
and justifying her politico-economic policy. 
It was now too late to lament the chivalrous 
attitude which had permitted the Goeben and 

1 Turkey had already violated her neutrality to our 
detriment many times. For instance, on September 25 
she had erected military works against us on the Sinai 
frontier; as far back as August 25 Turkish officers had 
seized Egyptian camels laden with foodstuffs. Moslem 
fidahis in Ottoman service endeavoured to incite the 
Egyptian Mohammedans against the British Government 
during the first half of October. 

2 August 13, 1914. 



PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP 157 

the Breslau to steam into the Dardanelles, or 
to regret the indifference we had persistently 
displayed to Near Eastern affairs for well-nigh 
twenty years. The best that could be done at 
that late hour was to face the consequences 
of those errors with dignity and to strive to 
repair them with alacrity. But all the efforts 
made were partial and successive. There was 
no attempt at co-ordination. 

Turkey's defection was a serious blow to the 
allied cause, not only in view of the positive, 
but also of the negative, advantages it was 
calculated to confer upon Germany. The 
Ottoman army, consisting of first-class raw 
materials, had had its latent qualities unfolded 
and matured by German organization, discipline 
and training. Its supplies were replenished. 
Ammunition factories were established. Bar- 
racks were built and fortifications equipped in 
congruity with latter-day needs. Three million 
pounds of German bar gold reached Constanti- 
nople, and were deposited in the branch offices 
of the Deutsche Bank there for the require- 
ments of the army. In all this the Kaiser's 
Government ran no risks. The return was 
guaranteed by the politico-economic measures 
which had been continuously applied during 
the years of our " disinterestedness." 

Enver had meanwhile risen to the zenith of 
his career. He was now War Minister and had 
surrounded himself with officers who would 
follow him whithersoever he might lead them. 
A low-sized, wiry man, seemingly of no account, 
Enver is pale of complexion, shuffling in gait. 
His eyes are piercing, and his gaze furtive. 
A soul-monger who should buy him at his 
specific value and sell him at his own estimate 
would earn untold millions. For, to use a 



158 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

picturesque Russian phrase, the ocean is only 
up to his knees. He is physically dauntless 
and buoyant. In the war against Italy he 
had fought well and organized the Arab and 
other native troops under conditions of great 
difficulty, winning laurels which have not yet 
withered. A Pole by extraction, Enver Pasha 
is a Prussian by training and sympathies, 
and a Turk by language and religion and by 
his marriage with a daughter of the Sultan. 
Political sense he has none. His one ideal 
was to earn the appreciation of the Prussian 
military authorities, to whom he looks up as 
a fervid disciple to peerless masters. German 
military praise melts his manhood and turns 
his brain. He possesses a dictatorial temper 
with none of the essential qualities of a dic- 
tator, and in the field he is distinguished, I 
am told, by splendid valour without an inkling 
of scientific strategy. 

It was that Polish Turk and his German 
masters who formally made war upon Russia, 
France and Britain. 1 And the Turkish nation 
had no opportunity to sanction or veto their 
resolve. Nay, even the majority of the 
Cabinet, including the Grand Vizier, had had 
no say on the issue, were not even informed 
of what was being done until overt acts of 
hostility had actually clinched the matter. 
Indeed, there was a majority of Cabinet 
Ministers in favour of neutrality, but it was 
ignored. In this way Turkey threw in her 
lot with the Teutons, 2 to the astonishment 

1 November 3, 1914. 

2 On October 25, 1908, after having studied the origins 
of the Turkish Revolution and the antecedents of its 
authors, and while all Europe was still warmly con- 
gratulating the Young Turks on their bloodless victory 



PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP 159 

of the Allies, who had hoped that a policy of 
forbearance and meekness would elicit a 
friendly response and frustrate the effect of 
the master strokes by which Germany, during 
a long series of years, had consolidated her 
ascendancy over Turkey and obtained the 
command of the Ottoman army. The childish 
notion that a sudden exhibition of pacific 
intentions and goodwill is enough to foil the 
carefully laid schemes of a clever enemy which 
have been maturing for decades, is the refrain 
that runs through the history of our foreign 
policy for the last thirty or forty years. And 
not only through the history of our foreign 
policy. Faith in the sacramental efficacy of 
an improvisation is a trait common to all the 
Allies, but in the British nation it is the faith 
that is expected to move mountains. 

The negative aspect of Turkey's belligerency 
proved to be quite as irksome as the positive. 
For it involved the closing of the Dardanelles 
to Russia's corn export and the disappearance 

and moderation, I dispatched the following telegraphic 
message to the Daily Telegraph — 

" Most unwillingly do I give utterance to facts and 
impressions calculated to introduce a jarring note 
into the harmonious optimism of Western peoples, 
who confidently augur great things of the young 
Ottoman nation, and discern no difficulties likely to 
become formidable dangers to the new-born State. 
But a knowledge of all the essential data is indis- 
pensable to correct the diagnosis without which the 
malady cannot be successfully treated. Emancipa- 
tion, then, has produced a beneficent enthusiasm for 
the political ideals of Europe in minds hitherto im- 
permeable to Western notions, but has neither trans- 
formed the national character nor supplied the revolu- 
tionary movement with the requisite constructive 
forces. Neither can it break the fateful continuity 
of Turkish history nor avert the defects of the destructive 
causes that have been operative here for generations." 



160 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

of the principal route for communications 
between the Tsardom and its Western allies. 
Archangel is blocked in winter and inadequately 
connected by rail with the two capitals in 
summer. This additional embarrassment and 
its financial sequel compelled the attention of 
the Allies to the need of some kind of co- 
operation — just to satisfy actual needs. For 
neither then nor at any subsequent period was 
there any pretence of laying open the whole 
ground and building a complete structure 
upon that. A temporary expedient is all 
that was contemplated, and nothing more last- 
ing was evoked. None the less, the Confer- 
ence of the three Finance Ministers in Paris x 
marked a step in advance, and was subsequently 
followed up by a closer and more continuous 
contact. 

1 February 6, 1915, and the following three days. 



CHAPTER XIII 

PROBLEMS OF FINANCE 

Finances are the nerve of warfare, and in 
a contest which can be decided only by the 
exhaustion of one of the belligerents they are, 
so to say, the central nerve system. The 
Germans being astute financiers, and aware 
that the war to which their policy was leading 
would soon break out, had made due prepara- 
tions, with a surprising grasp of detail. Nothing 
was forgotten and nothing neglected. And 
success rewarded their efforts. The result was 
that they mobilized their finances long before 
they had begun to mobilize their troops. 

France, on the contrary, persuaded that 
peace would not be disturbed, took no thought 
of the morrow. Yet her budgetary estimates 
showed an ugly deficit. This gap, however, 
would have been filled up in the ordinary 
course of things by a big loan which was about 
to be floated. But M. Caillaux, probably the 
most clever financier in France, who, if he 
applied his knowledge and resourcefulness to 
the furtherance of his country's interests, could 
achieve great things, used them — and together 
with them his parliamentary influence — to 
upset the Cabinet and thwart the loan scheme. 
Then, taking over the portfolio of the Finance 
Minister in the new Cabinet, he arranged for 
borrowing a small instead of a large amount, 
thereby exposing his country to risks more 

M 161 



162 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

serious than the public realized. For it was a 
heavy disadvantage on the eve of the most 
exhausting struggle ever entered upon by the 
French people, whose strongest position was 
weakened as no enemy could have weakened it. 

Russia was in a different, but nowise better, 
position when suddenly called upon to meet 
the onerous demands of the world-contest. 
She, too, having pinned her faith to the 
maintenance of peace, had made no prepara- 
tions for war, financial or military. Moreover, 
a considerable sum of her money was at the 
time deposited in various foreign countries, 
and especially in France, for the service of her 
loans and the payment of State orders placed 
with various firms. This money, on the out- 
break of hostilities, was automatically im- 
mobilized by the moratorium, although the 
delicate question whether a moratorium can 
be legally applied to sums thus deposited by 
a foreign Government has not yet been de- 
cided with finality. As a matter of fact, 
Russia's deposits remained where they were, 
and could not be utilized. The consequences 
of this embargo were irksome, and for a time 
threatened to become dangerous. Little by 
little, however, these restrictions were re- 
moved, partly by the French Government and 
partly by the spontaneous efforts of the banks. 

France, too, suffered in a like way from the 
paralysing effect of the moratorium. For the 
French had no less than half a milliard francs 
lent out at interest for short terms in Russia. 
This sum could, as it chanced, have been re- 
funded at once without inconvenience, seeing 
that it was liquid in the banks of Petrograd, 
Moscow, Warsaw, and other cities of the Tsar- 
dom. But as the money was in Russian roubles, 



PROBLEMS OF FINANCE 163 

and all international exchange had ceased, it too 
was incapable of being converted into francs. 
Thus the two allies, although really flush of 
money, were undergoing some of the hard- 
ships of impecuniosity, and to extricate them 
from this tangle was a task that called for the 
exercise of uncommon ingenuity. This happily 
was forthcoming. 

But that was only one aspect of a larger 
and more momentous business which the 
financiers of the Entente Powers had to set 
themselves to tackle. Another of its bearings 
was the effect of the war upon the rate of 
exchange of the rouble, which is of moment 
to all the Allies. Indeed, so long as the con- 
flict lasts the smooth working of the financial 
machines of the three States is of as much 
moment to each and all as is the winning of 
battles and the raising of fresh armies. In 
this struggle and at least until the curtain has 
fallen upon the final scene, the maintenance 
of financial credit and the purveyance of ready 
cash, together with all the subsidiary issues to 
which these operations may give rise, should 
be discussed and settled in common. 

During the present world combat, which 
has not its like in history, whether we con- 
sider the issues at stake, the number of troops 
engaged, or the destructive forces let loose, 
the ordinary narrow conceptions of mutual 
assistance, financial and other, with their 
jealous care of flaccid interests, cannot be 
persisted in. The basic principle on which 
it behoves the allied Powers to sustain each 
other's vitality can only be the community of 
resources within the limits traced by national 
needs. For our cause is one and indivisible, 
and a success of one of the Allies is a success 



164 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

of all. Hence, although we move from differ- 
ent starting-points and by unconnected roads, 
we are one community in motive, tendencies 
and sacrifices. The sense of Fate, whose 
deepening shadow now lies across the civilized 
nations of the Old Continent, has evoked the 
sympathies of the partner peoples for each 
other, and temporarily obliterated many of the 
points of artificial distinction which owed their 
existence to national egotism. 

Russia's resources, then, were immobilized 
at the outset of the war. The minister who 
had spent thirty-five years in the financial 
department of State had resigned shortly 
before. His successor, a man of considerable 
capacity and good intentions, was bereft of 
the help of the best permanent officials of 
the Ministry, who had followed the outgoing 
minister into retirement. And no minister 
ever needed help more sorely than M. Bark. 
For the sudden cessation of all international 
exchange and the consequent immobilization 
of Russia's financial reserve, made it tempor- 
arily impossible for her to satisfy demands 
which could easily have been met under 
circumstances less disconcerting. Here her 
British ally came to the rescue. In the first 
place, the British Government gave its guaran- 
tee to the Bank of England for the acceptances 
which this bank had discounted. These were 
of two kinds : all acceptances whatever dis- 
counted before hostilities had broken out, and 
all commercial acceptances discounted since 
the declaration of war. The measure which 
brought this welcome assistance was general in 
its form, but it included Russian bills accepted 
in London. And this discount by the Bank of 
England will continue until one year after the 



PROBLEMS OF FINANCE 165 

close of the campaign. In plain English, that 
means that the greater part of Russia's cash 
payments in London will be put off until then. 

In Russia's dealings with France a like 
trouble made itself felt, but the same remedy 
was not applied. The Government there did 
not offer a State guarantee for acceptances 
by the Ban que de France. The reasons for 
this difference of method are immaterial. The 
main point is that some other expedient had to 
be devised whereby Russia could discharge her 
short-term debts to her French creditors. In 
the Tsardom money was available for the 
purpose, but it was in roubles, which would 
first have to be exchanged into francs, and, 
as there was no rate of exchange, this opera- 
tion could be effected, if at all, only at a 
considerable and unnecessary loss. 

After several weeks' negotiations, and a 
thorough study of the question, an agreement 
was struck up between the Imperial Russian 
Bank and the Banque de France, by which 
the latter institution placed at the disposal of 
the former the requisite sum in francs which 
was specially earmarked for the payment of 
Russia's private debts in Paris. 

The fall in the rouble was partly caused by 
the diminution of Russian exports, in conse- 
quence of the closing of the Baltic, the Mediter- 
ranean, and the land routes via Germany and 
Austria. The whole harvest of 1914 lay 
garnered up in the Tsar's dominions, where 
prices fell to a low level, while the rouble lost 
one-fourth of its value. Russia's interest on 
her foreign debt was thus increased by twenty- 
five per cent. The Western allies, on the other 
hand, were paying huge sums for corn to 
neutrals. As in the long run all Entente 



166 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Powers will have to bear their share of eventual 
losses, it behoved them to prevent or moderate 
them. And this they accomplished to a limited 
extent. It might have been well to go further 
into the matter and consider the advisability 
of entering into closer partnership than was 
established by their concerted efforts in Paris. 
An economic league with privileges for im- 
portation and exportation accorded to all its 
members — and only to these — not merely during 
the war but for a series of years after the con- 
clusion of peace, might perhaps have tended 
to solve that and kindred problems. But the 
Allied Governments were constitutionally averse 
to taking long views or adopting comprehensive 
measures. 

But the reopening of the Dardanelles and 
the liberation of Russia's corn supplies called 
for immediate attention and a concrete plan of 
campaign. The idea of rigging out a naval and 
military expedition had been mooted in London 
before the Financial Conference in Paris, but 
on grounds which do not yet constitute 
materials for public history it was dropped. 
At the Conference the scheme was again taken 
up, and the previous objections to its exe- 
cution having been successfully met it was 
unanimously accepted. It is worth observing 
that the original plan, so far as the present 
writer was cognizant of it, was coherent, ade- 
quate and feasible, and involved co-ordination 
on the part of all three Allies. It did not con- 
template a purely naval expedition to the 
Dardanelles, but provided for a mixed force 
of land and sea troops, of which the number 
was considerable and under the conditions 
then prevalent might also have been ample for 
the purpose. Although the Allies had thus 



PROBLEMS OF FINANCE 167 

made what they believed to be adequate pro- 
vision for the success of their project, they 
took measures to render assurance doubly 
sure. They entered into pourparlers with 
Greece, from whose co-operation they antici- 
pated advantages which would tell with de- 
cisive force not only on the outcome of the 
expedition but also on the upshot of the war. 

Venizelos was approached and sounded on 
the subject. His authority in his country, 
like that of Bismarck on the eve of his fall, 
was held to be supreme. For he had saved 
Greece from anarchy and the dynasty from 
banishment; he had reorganized the army, 
strengthened the navy, established good govern- 
ment at home, extended the boundaries of the 
realm and laid the foundations of a regenerate 
State which might in time reunite under the 
royal sceptre most of the scattered elements of 
Hellenism. His personal relations with King 
Constantine were, however, understood to be 
wanting in cordiality, but the monarch was 
credited with sufficient acumen to perceive 
where the interests of his dynasty and country 
lay, and with common sense enough to allow 
them to be safeguarded and furthered. It was 
on these unsifted assumptions that the Govern- 
ments of the allied Powers went to work. 

One redoubtable obstacle to be dislodged 
before any headway could be made was 
Bulgaria's opposition. In order to displace 
it, it would be necessary to acquiesce in her 
demands for territory possessed by her neigh- 
bours. And in view of the intimate relations, 
political and economical, which the military 
empires had established with Bulgaria and 
their firm hold over Ferdinand, even this 
retrocession might prove inadequate for the 



168 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

purpose. According to a binding arrange- 
ment between Serbia and Greece, no territorial 
concession running counter to the settlement 
of the Bucharest Treaty might be accorded to 
Bulgaria by either of the two contracting 
States, without the consent of the other. 
And now Venizelos was asked to signify his 
assent to the abandonment by Serbia of a 
part of the Macedonian province recently 
annexed. This point gained, he was further 
solicited to cede Kavalla and some 2000 
square kilometres of territory incorporated 
with Greece, to Bulgaria, in return for the 
future possession of 140,000 square kilometres 
in western Asia Minor. It was stipulated 
by him and hastily taken for granted by 
the Governments of the Allied States that 
these concessions, together with those which 
Serbia and Roumania were expected to make, 
would move Bulgaria to follow Russia's lead 
and enter the arena by the side of the Allies. 
But before Venizelos's readiness to compro- 
mise could be utilized as a practical element of 
the negotiations, the Bulgarian Cabinet had 
applied for and received an advance of 150 
million francs from the two Central empires 
on conditions which, in the judgment of the 
Greek Premier, rendered further dealings with 
that State nugatory. 

At the same time King Constantine, yield- 
ing to German importunity and to personal 
emotions, adopted a series of measures of 
which the effect would have been to discredit 
in the eyes of the nation Venizelos's patriotism 
as a minister and his veracity as an individual. 
The upshot of these machinations was the 
voluntary retirement of the Premier from 
public life, the dissolution of the Greek Parlia- 



PROBLEMS OF FINANCE 169 

ment, the accession to power of a Germano- 
phile Cabinet, and the frustration of that part 
of the Allies' plan which had for its object the 
immediate co-operation of Greece and the sub- 
sequent enlistment of the neighbouring Balkan 
States. As yet, however, Greece was not wholly 
lost to the Entente. Another opportunity pre- 
sented itself which, had it been seized by the 
Governments of Great Britain and France, 
might yet have altered the course of Balkan 
history. But the acceptable offer in which it 
was embodied by the Hellenic Government 
elicited no response whatever in London or 
Paris. This was the last hope. Thencefor- 
ward the Allies were constrained to rely upon 
their own unaided exertions. 

How they approached the problem thus 
modified, and to what degree and in conse- 
quence of what technical occurrences the 
achievement fell short of reasonable expecta- 
tions, are matters which do not come within 
the scope of this summary narrative of historic 
events. It may suffice to contrast the belief, 
which in March 1915 was widespread — that the 
Dardanelles would be forced and Constan- 
tinople captured in the space of four or five 
weeks — with the circumstance that since then 
the British troops alone had nearly a hundred 
thousand casualties and that in the month of 
January 1916 it became evident that nothing 
could be gained by further prolonging this pain- 
ful effort, and the enterprise was abandoned. 

In spite of Turkey's hostility, the tone of 
the Allied Press lost little of its buoyancy. 
Japan, who had declared war on Germany 
in August, 1 had since captured Kiao Chau, 2 
and that achievement coupled with the results 
1 August 23, 1914. * November 6, 1914. 



170 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

of four months' warfare in Europe were held 
to be promising. For Germany's original 
plan of campaign had been foiled, her army 
driven back from Paris, and Austria had been 
defeated in Galicia. If on the debit side 
of the balance nearly all Belgium and nine 
departments of France had fallen into the 
enemy's hands, it was some solace to learn 
that the military authorities of the Allies had 
reckoned with all that from the outset. Every 
reverse sustained by their arms turned out to 
have been foreseen and discounted by their 
sagacious leaders. Then, again, it was argued 
that time was on our side, enabling us to 
develop our resources, which are much vaster 
than those of the enemy. To this way of 
looking at the situation the writer of these 
lines opposed another. " There is," he wrote, 
" a small section of the nation, men conver- 
sant with the aims, modes of thought, and 
military, financial, and economic resources of 
the enemy, whose gloomy forecasts in the 
past have been unhappily fulfilled in the 
present, and who would gladly see more con- 
clusive evidence than has yet been offered that 
everything which can be done at a given 
moment to turn the scale more decisively in 
our favour is being expeditiously undertaken 
by the responsible authorities. 

" They are afraid that the gravity of the 
issues for which we are fighting, the telling 
initial advantages secured by the wily enemy, 
the formidable nature of the difficulties in the 
way of decisive victory, and the tremendous 
sacrifices which we shall all be called upon to 
make before we come in sight of the goal, 
have not yet filtered down into the conscious- 
ness of any considerable section of the people." 






PROBLEMS OF FINANCE 171 

Many months later 1 Mr. Lloyd George re- 
echoed that judgment when dealing with the 
Welsh miners' strike. 

But optimism continued to prevail among the 
allied peoples, who through the Press proclaimed 
their conviction that ultimate and complete suc- 
cess was a foregone conclusion. At the same 
time, however, an eager desire to hasten this con- 
summation found vent among a considerable sec- 
tion of politicians, more particularly in France. 
And one of the means by which they hoped to 
attain their goal was by inviting Japan to co- 
operate with the Allies in Europe. As " invita- 
tion " was the term employed, the peculiar 
manner in which the idea was conceived hardly 
needs definition. To the Japanese themselves 
the inference was patent and distasteful. There- 
tofore it had been a dogma that France, Britain 
and Russia, being quite capable of crushing 
Germany and Austria, neither attempted nor 
wished to draw any neutral or Asiatic nation into 
the sanguinary maelstrom of war. And even now 
it was held to be undignified to swerve from that 
doctrine. Help therefore, it was contended, 
was not indispensable to victory, it was merely 
desirable from the humanitarian standpoint 
of putting an early end to the campaign and 
sparing the lives of millions. 

French statesmen of the calibre of MM. 
Pichon and Clemenceau pushed into the fore- 
ground of international politics this question 
of Japan's military intervention in Europe. 
An organized Press campaign was carried on in 
several of the most prominent daily papers 
and reviews of Paris. 2 Striking arguments 

1 July 1915. 

1 In the Petit Journal, the Homme Enchaini, Vlllustra- 
Hon, the Revue Hebdomadaire, and the Revue. 



172 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

were put forward in support of the thesis that 
Japan's co-operation in Europe is desirable, 
and the inference which many readers were 
encouraged to draw was that if the aim had 
not yet been attained, failure should be ascribed 
to the statesmanship of the Allies, which was 
deficient in sagacity, or to their diplomacy, 
which was wanting in resourcefulness. M. 
Pichon, in a masterly article in the Revue, 
wrote : " I am one of those who hold that 
(Japan) could bring to us here on the European 
continent an incomparable force, and I remain 
convinced that the Japanese Government would 
like nothing better than to respond to the 
appeal of the Triple Entente Powers if these 
requested its collaboration for future combats." x 

The idea was that Japanese troops should 
come to southern Europe, combine with the 
Serbs and create a new front there. This 
diversion, it was contended, would transform 
the slow and costly siege war and give the 
Allies access to Germany. And these decisive 
results could be achieved by an expedition of 
less than half a million Japanese warriors. 

When it was asked what motives could be 
held out to Nippon potent enough to deter- 
mine her to embark on such an enterprise, 
the reply was that she had a positive interest 
to undertake the task. For by contributing 
to the defeat of Germany in Europe she would 
free herself from Teutonic machinations in the 
Far East. The Allies would, of course, have 
to promise her territorial compensation com- 
mensurate with her sacrifices. And after the 
conclusion of peace Japan would extract from 
Germany not only a sum big enough to cover 
all the expenses of the expedition, but also a 
1 Fevrier, Revue, 1915, p. 195. 



PROBLEMS OF FINANCE 173 

heavy war indemnity. Over and above this, 
France and Britain would enable her to float 
on easy terms a loan of some three hundred 
millions sterling, as a moderate return for the 
three or four months curtailment of the war 
which costs the Allies nearly a hundred and 
twenty millions a month. Lastly, Japan's 
horn would be vastly exalted and her prestige 
increased by her participation in the most 
tremendous conflict recorded in history. 

Considered on its merits the enterprise im- 
pressed one more by its arduousness than by 
the tangible advantages it offered to either 
of the interested parties. The technical diffi- 
culties were many and well-nigh insurmount- 
able : the lack of transports, the distance 
at which the Mikado's troops in Europe would 
be from their base of supplies, and the length 
of time that must elapse before they could 
replenish their stores of ammunition, whether 
these were drawn from Tokyo or manu- 
factured in Europe. And half a million fight- 
ing men, however well trained, would repre- 
sent but a drop in the ocean when flung against 
the millions to whom they would be opposed. 

Still more decisive was the question of 
motive. Why should the Japanese sacrifice 
their brave soldiers ? For the sake of terri- 
tory which they do not yet covet, or of prestige 
which they enjoy in a superlative degree 
already ? Although chivalrous and highly im- 
pressible to everything that can appeal to a 
high-minded people, they are also practical 
and far-sighted and are not to be lured by a 
will-o'-the-wisp. They had already assisted 
the Allies in the Far East and performed their 
part admirably. 

The Japanese army is made up of patriots 



174 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

whose lives belong to their country. To their 
spirit of self-sacrifice there are no bounds. 
And that this splendid organism should be im- 
plicitly set down as a band of mercenaries 
capable of being bought and sold is more than 
its leaders can brook. The idea that mere 
money or money's worth could purchase 
Japanese blood is resented by our Far Eastern 
Ally. Between Europe and Asia Japan is the 
connecting link. Her people are endowed 
with some of the highest qualities of the 
European and the Asiatic. Their civilization 
is ancient and refined, and they understand 
and appreciate that of Europe. The chivalry 
of the Samurai is recognized universally. 
Their respect for their plighted word is 
scrupulous. And their tact and moderation 
have been demonstrated time and again 
during their relations first with Russia and 
then with the United States. Japan's imme- 
diate task lies in the Far East, and to that 
region she is minded to confine her activity, 
as was shown by the pressure which she soon 
afterwards put upon China. None the less, 
it is symptomatic of feelings which are still 
inarticulate and of currents which flow beneath 
the surface, that more than once of late the 
Russian Press has called for a defensive and 
offensive alliance between the Tsardom and 
Japan. 1 That it will come and exert a note- 
worthy influence on the politics of the world, 
is the firm conviction of the present writer, 
who has had the good fortune to contribute 
more than once to bring the two Powers 
closer together. 2 

1 Cf. Novoye Vremya, June 26, 1915. 

2 See Hayashi's Secret Memoirs. 



CHAPTER XIV 

READJUSTMENTS 

Deprived of the help for which they had 
looked to Japan, the publicists and politicians 
of the allied countries now centred their hopes 
on the neutrals and on Kitchener's great army, 
which was to appear on the scene in spring, 
put an end to the warfare of the trenches, and 
free Belgium from the Teuton yoke. The im- 
pending belligerency of certain of the neutrals 
would, it was reasonably believed, turn the 
scales in favour of Britain, France and Russia. 
Indeed, Bulgaria alone, owing to her com- 
manding geographical position, might have 
achieved the feat more than once during the 
campaign. With the death of King Carol of 
Roumania 1 the probability of this consum- 
mation seemed to verge on certitude. It 
aroused high hopes among the Allies. 

The propitious moment seemed to have 
come for the union of all Roumanians under 
the sceptre of the new king. Over three 
million members of that race under Hungarian 
sway had long been waging a losing contest 
for their nationality, language and religion. 
And they entertained no hope of better pro- 
spects in the future. For in view of her mili- 
tary inferiority Roumania, with her little army 
of half a million men, could not indulge in 
energetic protests against the treatment meted 

1 October 10, 1914. 
175 



176 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

out to her kindred by Hungary. She had no 
choice but to resign herself to the inevitable. 
Diplomatically, too, she was bound to Austria 
by a secret convention, concluded by the 
Hohenzollern prince who had presided over her 
destinies for a generation. Economically she 
was, as we saw, tied hand and foot to Germany. 
Moreover, it was a matter of common know- 
ledge that King Carol would never tolerate 
any radical change in the political orientation 
of the kingdom. To the writer of these lines 
he said so in plain words shortly before he died, 
and he also charged him with a message of 
the same tenor to the Austro-Hungarian 
Minister of Foreign Affairs. But, loyal and 
conscientious, as was his wont, King Carol 
added that if circumstances should ever necessi- 
tate a radical change in Roumania's attitude, 
a younger ruler might usher it in, for whom 
he would not hesitate to make room. 

This eventuality arose in September 1 when 
the Russians defeated the Austrians, occupied 
Lemberg, threatened Cracow, took up strong 
positions on the Carpathians, and bade fair 
to overrun Hungary. Fate, it seemed, had 
at last overtaken the Habsburg Monarchy, 
which, contrary to general expectation, had not 
succumbed to internal strife on the outbreak 
of the war. And it now lay with Roumania 
and her neighbours to play the part of Fate's 
executors. As a matter of fact, Roumania 
suddenly found a sonorous voice in which 
to utter her grievances against the Teutons. 
Senators, deputies, ex-ministers executed a 
chassez croisez movement through France, Italy 
and Britain, delivering diatribes against Austria- 
Hungary, arousing sympathy for Roumania, 
1 September 8, 1914. 



READJUSTMENTS 177 

and proclaiming their country's resolve to 
strike a blow for justice, liberty and civilization. 
The names of Senator Istrati, M. Diamandy, 
and Dr. Constantinescu were associated with 
feasts of patriotic sentiment and flow of soul. 
Military delegates in Paris made extensive 
purchases of various necessaries for the 
commissariat and sanitary departments of 
the War Ministry, and the date on which the 
gallant Roumanian nation would unsheathe 
its sword in the cause of humanity was un- 
officially announced. 

At that moment the country was governed, 
as it still is, by a Premier who might appropri- 
ately be termed its Dictator, so little influence 
on his policy and methods is wielded by his 
colleagues in the Cabinet. John Bratiano is 
the sole trustee of the nation at the most 
critical period of its history. The son of an 
eminent and deservedly respected statesman, 
this politician entered public life encircled by 
the halo of his father's prestige. Gifted with 
considerable powers, he owes more to birth 
than to hard work and self-discipline. Enter- 
ing early upon his valuable political heritage 
he found all paths smoothed, all doors open 
to him. The leadership of the most influential 
parliamentary party fell to him at an age 
when other politicians are painfully struggling 
with the preliminary difficulties in the way of 
success, and John Bratiano became the ruler 
of Roumania without an effort. Descended 
from an illustrious stock, he is penetrated 
with an overmastering sense of his own personal 
responsibility, from which the principal relief 
to be obtained lies in the indefinite prolonga- 
tion of his liberty of choice. Finality in 
matters of momentous decision appears painful 



178 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

to him, and the standard of success which 
would fairly be applied to the policy of the 
ordinary statesman seems too lax for the man 
whose shoulders are pressed down with the 
weight of the kingdom as it is and the kingdom 
yet to come. Hence his anxiety to drive a 
brilliant bargain with the Allies and to leave 
no hold for hostile criticism at home. Like 
most patriots placed in responsible positions, 
he is bent on furthering what he considers 
the interests of his country in his own way, 
and honestly convinced that the right way is 
his own, he has hitherto declined to share 
responsibility with the Opposition — which dis- 
approves his Fabian policy — even though it 
numbers among its members a real statesman 
of the calibre and repute of Take Jonescu. 

At first M. Bratiano swam with the stream. 
He assured foreign diplomatists, eminent 
Italians and others, that Roumania had de- 
cided to throw in her lot with the Allies. And 
his declarations were re-echoed by his colleagues. 
These statements were duly transmitted to the 
various Cabinets interested, and the entry of 
Roumania into the struggle was reckoned with 
by all the Allied Powers. On the strength of 
these good intentions one of the Allies was 
asked to advance a certain sum of money for 
military preparations, and the request was 
complied with. Italy was approached and 
treated as a trusty confidant, and a tacit ar- 
rangement was come to with her by which 
each of the two Latin States was expected to 
communicate with the other as soon as it 
should decide to take the field. In fine, it was 
understood that Roumania would join in at 
the same time as Italy. 

Cognizant of those intentions and prepara- 



READJUSTMENTS 179 

tions the Allies rejoiced exceedingly. The 
prospect that opened out before them appeared 
cheerful. Kitchener's great army was to take 
the offensive in spring, Roumania's co-opera- 
tion was due some months or weeks previously, 
and the forcing of the Dardanelles might be 
counted upon as a corollary, to say nothing 
of the adherence of Greece and Bulgaria to 
the allied cause. But Germany and Austria 
lost nothing of their self-confidence. Clumsy 
though their professional diplomacy might 
be, their economico-diplomatic campaign had 
left little to be desired. Its fruits were ripe. 
They had firmly knitted the material interests 
of the little Latin State with their own, and 
could rely on the backing of nearly every 
supporter of Bratiano's Cabinet in the country. 
But leaving nothing to chance, they now put 
forth the most ingenious, persistent and costly 
efforts to maintain the ground they had won. 
Influential newspapers were bought or sub- 
sidized, new ones were founded, public servants 
were corrupted, calumnies were launched 
against the Allies and their supporters, and a 
nucleus of military men ranged themselves 
among the opponents of intervention. 

M. Bratiano suddenly turned wary and 
circumspect. His talk was now of the neces- 
sity of time for preparations, of the divergence 
of views between his Cabinet and that of the 
Tsar, and of the inadequacy of the motives 
held out to his country for belligerency. 
Thereupon negotiations began between Russia 
and Roumania, which dragged on endlessly. 
What the Roumanian Premier said to the 
Russian Minister was practically this : " The 
choice between belligerency and neutrality 
must be determined by the balance of territorial 



180 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

advantages offered by each. And the terms 
must be adequate and guaranteed." The con- 
ditions which, according to him, answered to 
this description consisted of the cession of 
all Transylvania, part of the Banat of Temes- 
var, the Roumanian districts of Bukovina, 
and of the province of Crishana and Marmaros. 
About Transylvania there was no dissentient 
voice : it was admitted that it ought by right 
to form part of the Roumanian kingdom. The 
dispute between Bucharest and Petrograd 
hinged on a zone of the Banat and a strip of 
Bukovina. The Tsar's Government admitted 
that Bukovina might be annexed by Rou- 
mania as far as the river Seret, but not farther 
north; whereas the Roumanian Premier in- 
sisted on obtaining the promise of a zone the 
northern boundary of which would be formed 
by the river Pruth, and would therefore in- 
clude the important city of Czernowitz, which 
is the capital of the province. The divergence 
of opinion arising out of this demand for the 
district of Pancsova in the Banat of Temesvar 
raised a formidable obstacle to an understand- 
ing, for the claim runs counter to the principle 
of nationality somewhat pedantically laid down 
by the Allied Powers. Parenthetically, it is 
worth remembering that hard-and-fast prin- 
ciples which lead insensibly to dogmatism 
cannot be too sedulously avoided by a Govern- 
ment. Politics must assuredly have its ideals, 
but compromise is the method by which alone 
it can approach them. The Allies have already 
been constrained by tyrannous circumstance 
to entertain important exceptions to their 
principle of nationality which was invoked 
against Italy's claim to Dalmatia, and in their 
own best interests they might have com- 



READJUSTMENTS 181 

promised on the subject of Bulgaria's claims 
to Macedonia, and of Roumania's pretensions 
to annex certain of the disputed territories 
inhabited by Serbs and Ruthenians. 

In truth, Roumania's attitude, of which at 
various times conflicting accounts have been 
given, appears to be what one might reason- 
ably expect, considering the sympathies of the 
nation, the interests of the State, and the 
requirements of the conjuncture. Looking at 
it from the view-point of the outsider, it would 
perhaps have been to her interest to join the 
Allies when the Russians, driving the Magyars 
and the Austrians before them, could have 
played the part of right wing to her armies. It 
was generally believed later on that she would 
unsheathe the sword at the same time as Italy. 
Informal announcements to that effect are 
known to have been made to certain official 
representatives of that country. And her 
failure to stand by these spontaneous declara- 
tions was the cause of profound disappoint- 
ment to the Entente and of a considerable 
loss of credit to herself. These facts and con- 
clusions appeal with irresistible force to the 
uninitiated, and in especial to those among 
them who are citizens of the belligerent States. 

But there is another aspect of the matter 
which, whatever effect its disclosure may have 
on the general verdict, is at any rate well worth 
considering. According to this version, which 
is based on what actually passed between 
Bucharest and the capitals of the Entente 
Powers, the central idea of Roumania's striv- 
ings was to achieve national unity together 
with defensible military frontiers as far as 
appeared feasible, and to obtain in advance 
implicit assurances that the Entente Powers, 



182 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

if victorious, would allow her claims without 
demur or delay. The territories occupied by 
the Roumanians of Transylvania, the Buko- 
vina, and the Banat were to be united under 
the sceptre of the King, including the strip 
which is contiguous to Belgrade. To this the 
Slavs demurred because Belgrade could then 
no longer remain the Serbian capital. But 
of these demands M. Bratiano would make 
no abatement, nor in the promise of the 
Entente to fulfil them would he admit of 
any ambiguity. Roumania's experience in 
1877, under M. Bratiano's father, when, after 
having helped Russia to defeat the Turks, she 
was deprived of Bessarabia and obliged to 
content herself with the Dobrudja, was the 
main motive for this striving after definite 
conditions, while her readiness to look upon 
that loss of Bessarabia as final moved her to 
demand every rood of Austro-Hungarian terri- 
tory which was inhabited by her kinsmen or 
had belonged to them in bygone days. These 
motives were inconsistent with the mooting 
of the Bessarabian question, and the state- 
ment so often made in the Press that Rou- 
mania demanded, and still demands, that lost 
province from Russia are absolutely ground- 
less. The subject was never once broached. 

It has been argued that although these 
claims to recompense may have been reason- 
able enough in themselves, to have made 
them conditions of Roumania's participation 
in the war on the side of the Allies smacked 
more of the pettifogger than of the statesman. 
In a tremendous struggle like the present for 
lofty ideals this bargaining for territorial ad- 
vantages showed, it was urged, the country 
and the Government in a sinister light. To 



READJUSTMENTS 183 

this criticism the friends of M. Bratiano reply- 
that most of the belligerents set the example, 
with far less reason than Roumania could 
plead. Italy, for instance, had made her 
military co-operation conditional on the pro- 
mise of a large part of Dalmatia, as well as 
the terra irredenta, and Russia insisted upon 
having her claim to Constantinople allowed. 
Why, it is asked, should Roumania be blamed 
for acting similarly and on more solid grounds ? 

During the first phase of the conversations 
which were carried on between Roumania 
and the Entente there would appear to have 
been no serious hitch. They culminated in 
a loan of £5,000,000 advanced in January 
1915. In the following month they ceased 
and were not resumed until April, when 
M. Bratiano was informed that it would 
facilitate matters if he would discuss terms 
with the Tsar's Government. By means of 
an exchange of notes an arrangement had 
been come to by which Roumania was to have 
" the country inhabited by the Roumanians 
of Austria-Hungary " in return for her neu- 
trality and on the express condition that she 
should occupy them par les armes before the 
close of the war. I announced this agreement 
in the summer of 1915 and, commenting on the 
controversy to which it gave rise, pointed out 
that it amounted only to a promise made by 
Russia and an option given to Roumania, which 
the latter state was at liberty to take up or 
forgo as it might think fit. It bound her to 
nothing. Consequently, to accuse her of hav- 
ing broken faith with Italy or the Entente is 
to betray a complete lack of acquaintance with 
the facts. 

It was only when Roumania's military par- 



184 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

ticipation was solicited that difficulties began 
to make themselves felt. And they proved 
insurmountable. So long as the Russian armies 
were victorious Roumania's demands were 
rejected. When the Tsar's troops, for lack of 
ammunition, were obliged to retreat, conces- 
sions were made very gradually, slight con- 
cessions at first, which became larger as the 
withdrawal proceeded, until finally — the Rus- 
sian troops being driven out — everything was 
conceded, when it was too late. For with the 
departure of the Russian armies Roumania 
was so exposed to attack from various sides, 
and so isolated from her protectors, that her 
military experts deemed intervention to be 
dangerous for herself and useless to the Allies. 
In Italy, it has been said with truth, the 
conviction prevailed that Roumania would 
descend into the arena as soon as the Salandra 
Cabinet had declared war against Austria, and 
a good deal of disappointment was caused by 
M. Bratiano's failure to come up to this ex- 
pectation. But the expectation was gratuitous 
and the disappointment imaginary. In an 
article written at the time I pointed out that 
one of the mistakes made by the Entente 
Powers consisted in the circuitous and clumsy 
way in which they negotiated with Roumania. 
The spokesman and guardian of Italy during 
the decisive conversations with the Entente was 
the Foreign Minister, Baron Sonnino, the silent 
member of the Cabinet. Now, this turned out 
to be a very unfortunate kind of guardianship, 
which his ward subsequently repudiated with 
reason. For one effect of his taciturnity — the 
Roumanians ascribed it to his policy — was to 
keep Roumania in the dark about matters of 
vital moment to her of which she ought to have 



READJUSTMENTS 185 

had cognizance. Another was to treat with 
the Entente Governments as though Roumania 
had sold her will and private judgment to the 
Salandra Cabinet. This, however, is a curious 
story of war diplomacy which had best be left 
to the historian to recount. One day it will 
throw a new light upon matters of great 
interest which are misunderstood at present. 
Roumania's co-operation then, as now, would 
have been of much greater help to the Allies 
than certain other results which were secured 
by sacrificing it. And sacrificed it was quite 
wantonly. We are wont to sneer at Germany's 
diplomacy as ridiculously clumsy, and to 
plume ourselves on our own as tactful and 
dignified. Well, if one were charged with 
the defence of this thesis, the last source to 
which one would turn for evidence in sup- 
port of it is our diplomatic negotiations with 
M. Bratiano's Cabinet. 

In the light of this expose the severe judg- 
ments that have been passed on the policy of 
the Roumanian Cabinet may have to be revised. 

The crux of the situation was the attitude 
of Bulgaria. Bulgaria, a petty country with a 
population inferior to that of London, impreg- 
nated with Teutonism and ruled by an Austro- 
Hungarian officer who loathes the Slavs, had 
throughout this sanguinary clash of peoples 
rendered invaluable services to the Teutons 
and indirectly inflicted incalculable losses on 
the civilized nations of the globe. This 
tremendous power for evil springs from her 
unique strategic position in Eastern Europe. 
At any moment during the conflict her active 
assistance would have won Constantinople and 
Turkey for the Allies, and if proffered during 
one of several particularly favourable con- 



186 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

junctures might have speedily ended the war. 
But so tight was Germany's grip on her that 
she not only withheld her own aid, but actually 
threatened to fall foul of any of the Balkan 
States that should tender theirs. It is, there- 
fore, no exaggeration to affirm that the duration 
of this war and some of the most doleful events 
chronicled during the first year of its prosecu- 
tion, are due to the insidious behaviour of 
Ferdinand of Coburg and his Bulgarian coad- 
jutors. One may add that this behaviour 
constitutes a brilliant and lasting testimony 
to the foresight and resourcefulness of German 
diplomacy. It is one of the products of 
German organization as distinguished from 
French and British individualism. 

While Bulgaria was thus holding the menace 
of her army over Roumania's head, and M. 
Bratiano stood irresolute between belligerency 
and neutrality, the German and Austrian 
armies were effectively co-operating with Ger- 
man and Austrian diplomatists. They com- 
pelled the Russians to withdraw from Eastern 
Prussia, 1 and from a part of Galicia, 2 later on 
from Lodz, from the Masurian Lakes and 
Bukovina. 3 Gradually Roumania saw herself 
bereft of what would have been her right wing 
and cover, and her military men, the most 
influential of whom had been against inter- 
vention from the first, now declared the 
moment inauspicious on strategical grounds. 
Thereupon the oratorical representatives of 
the Roumanian people consoled themselves 
with the formula that Roumanian blood would 
be shed only for Roumanian interests, and that 
when a fresh turn of Fortune's wheel should 

1 October 13, 1914. 2 December 6, 1914. 

8 February 15, 1915. 



REAJDUSTMENTS 187 

bring the Russian troops back to Bukovina and 
Galicia, the gallant Roumanians would strike a 
blow for their country and civilization. 

It would be unfruitful to enter into a detailed 
examination of the efforts of the Allies to 
detach the neutrals, and in especial the Balkan 
States, from the Military Empires with which 
their interests had been elaborately bound 
up. But in passing, one may fairly question 
the wisdom of their general plan, which 
established facts — still fragmentary in character 
— enable us to reconstruct. The resuscitation 
of the Balkan League and the mobilization of 
its forces against Turkey was an enterprise 
from which the greatest statesmen of the 
nineteenth century, were they living, would 
have recoiled. For it presupposes an ascetic 
frame of mind among the little States, which 
in truth hate each other more intensely than 
they ever hated the Turks. The first con- 
dition of success, were success conceivable, 
would have been the abrogation of the Treaty 
of Bucharest and the redistribution of the 
territories, which its authors had divided with 
so little regard for abstract justice and the 
stability of peace. And to this procedure, 
which Bulgaria ostentatiously demanded, Serbia 
entered a firm demurrer in which she was joined 
by Greece. For Serbs and Bulgars have always 
been hypnotized by Macedonia. Their gaze 
is fixed on that land as by some magic fascina- 
tion, which interest and reason are powerless 
to break. They think of the future develop- 
ment, nay of the very existence of their 
respective nations, as indissolubly intertwined 
with it. To lose Macedonia, therefore, is to 
forfeit the life-secret of nation. Hence Bul- 
garia obstinately refused to abate one jot of 



188 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

her demands, while Serbia was firmly resolved 
to reject them. It mattered nothing that the 
fate of all Europe and of these two States was 
dependent on compromise. The little nations 
took no account of the interests at stake. 
Each, like Sir Boyle Roche, was ready to 
sacrifice the whole for a part, and felt proud 
of its wisdom and will-power. 

Under these circumstances the scheme of a 
resuscitated Balkan League should have been 
accounted a political chimera, whereas politics 
is the art of the possible. What might per- 
haps have been envisaged with utility was the 
selection of the less mischievous and more 
helpful of the unwelcome alternatives with 
which the allied diplomacy was confronted. 
If, for instance, it could have been conclusively 
shown that Bulgaria's help was indispensable, 
adequate and purchasable, the plain course 
would have been to pay handsomely for that. 
However high the price, it would have been 
more than compensated by the positive and 
negative gains. If, on the other hand, Bul- 
garia were recalcitrant and inexorable, the 
Tsardom which protected her might to some 
good purpose have become equally so, and 
displayed firmness and severity. It has been 
said that Russia cannot find it in her heart 
either to coerce Serbia or to punish Bulgaria. 
If this be a correct presentation of her temper — 
and in the past it corresponded to the reality 
— then the Allies are up against an in- 
surmountable obstacle which must be looked 
upon as one of the instruments of Fate. 

Our Press is never tired of repeating that the 
neutrals have a right to think only of their 
own interest and to frame their policy in 
strict accordance with that, whether it draws 



READJUSTMENTS 189 

them towards the Allies or the Teuton camp. 
To this principle exception may be taken. If 
it be true that the European community, its 
civilization and all that that connotes are in 
grave danger, then every member of that 
community is liable to be called on for help, 
and is bound to tender it. In such a crisis 
it is a case of every one being against us who 
is not actively with us. Otherwise the con- 
tention that this is no ordinary war but a 
criminal revolt against civilization, is a mere 
piece of claptrap and is properly treated as 
such by the neutrals. But there is another 
important side of the matter which has not 
yet been seriously considered. If the neu- 
trals are warranted in ignoring the common 
interest and restricting themselves to the 
furtherance of their own, it is surely meet 
that the Allies, too, should enjoy the full 
benefits of this principle and frame their 
entire policy— economic, financial, political and 
military— with a view to promoting their com- 
mon weal, and with no more tender regard 
for that of the non-belligerent States than is 
conducive to the success of their cause and 
in strict accordance with international law. 
The application of this doctrine would find its 
natural expression in the creation of an econo- 
mic league of the Allied States with privileges 
restricted to its members. It may not be 
irrelevant to state that during one phase of 
the war combined action of the kind alluded 
to would have given the Allies the active help 
of one or two neutral countries. Nay, if the 
exportation of British coal alone had been 
restricted to the belligerents, the hesitation of 
those countries between neutrality and belli- 
gerency would have been overcome in a month. 



190 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Italy and Bulgaria, being the two nations 
whose attitude would in the judgment of 
German statesmen have the furthest reaching 
consequences on the war, were also the object 
of their unwearied attentions. And every 
motive which could appeal to the interest or 
sway the sentiment of those peoples was set 
before them in the light most conducive to 
the aims of the tempter. Those painstaking 
efforts were duly rewarded. Bulgaria, before 
abandoning her neutrality, had contributed 
more effectively even than Turkey to retard 
the Allies' progress and to facilitate that of 
their adversaries. 

For Italy's restiveness Germany was pre- 
pared, but it was reasonably hoped that with 
a mixture of firmness, forbearance and gener- 
osity that nation would be prevailed upon to 
maintain a neutrality which the various agents 
at work in the peninsula could render per- 
manently benevolent. And from the fateful 
August 3, 1914, down to the following May, 
the course of events attested the accuracy of 
this forecast. At first all Italy was opposed 
to belligerency. Deliberate reason, irrational 
prejudice, religious sentiment, political cal- 
culation, economic interests and military con- 
siderations all tended to confirm the popula- 
tion in its resolve to keep out of the sanguinary 
struggle. The Vatican, its organs and agents, 
brought all their resources to bear upon devout 
Catholics, whose name is legion and whose 
immediate aim was the maintenance of peace 
with the Central empires. The commercial 
and industrial community was tied to Germany 
by threads as fine, numerous and binding as 
those that rendered Gulliver helpless in the 
hands of the Lilliputians. The common people, 



READJUSTMENTS 191 

heavily taxed and poorly paid, yearned for 
peace and an opportunity to better their 
material lot. The Parliament was at the beck 
and call of a dictator who was moved by party 
interests to co-operate with the Teutons, while 
the Senate, which favoured neutrality on in- 
dependent grounds, had made it a rule to 
second every resolution of the Chamber. In a 
word, although Italy might wax querulous and 
importunate, her complaints and her demands 
would, it was assumed, play a part only in the 
scheme of diplomatic tactics, but would never 
harden into pretexts for war. 

For it was a matter of common knowledge 
that departure from the attitude of neutrality, 
whatever its ultimate effects — and these would 
certainly be fateful — must first lead to a long 
train of privations, hardships and economic 
shocks, which would subject the limited stay- 
ing powers of the nation — accustomed to peace, 
and only now beginning to thrive — to a search- 
ing, painful and dangerous test. From a 
Government impressed by this perspective, and 
conscious of its responsibility, careful delibera- 
tion, rather than high-pitched views, were 
reasonably expected. 

And the attitude of the Cabinet since August 
1914 had been marked by the utmost caution 
and self-containment. Contemplated from a 
distance by certain of the Allies whose attention 
was absorbed by the political aspect of the 
matter, this method of cool calculation seemed 
to smack of hollow make-believe. Why, it was 
asked, should Italy hold back or weigh the 
certain losses against the probable gains, seeing 
that she would have as allies the two most 
puissant States of Europe, and the enormous 
advantage of sea power on her side ? 



CHAPTER XV 

THE POSITION OF ITALY 

But intervention in the war was not one of 
those ordinary enterprises on which Italy 
might reasonably embark, after having care- 
fully counted up the cost in men and money 
and allowed a reasonable margin for unforeseen 
demands on both. In this venture the liabili- 
ties were unlimited, whereas the resources of 
the nation were bounded, the limits being much 
narrower than in the case of any other Great 
Power. And this was a truly hampering cir- 
cumstance. Serious though it was, however, 
it would hardly avail to deter a nation from 
accepting the risks and offering up the sacri- 
fices requisite, if the motive were at once 
adequate, peremptory and pressing. 

But Italy, unlike the Allies, had had no 
strong provocation to draw the sword. Griev- 
ances she undoubtedly possessed in plenty. 
She had been badly dealt with by her allies, 
but forbearance was her rule of living. For 
nearly a generation she had been a partner of 
the two militarist States, yet she shrank from 
severing her connection with them, even when 
they deliberately broke their part of the com- 
pact. This breach of covenant not only dis- 
pensed her from taking arms on their side, 
but would also, owing to the consequences it 
involved, have sufficed to warrant her ad- 
hesion to the Entente Powers. But for con- 

192 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 193 

elusive reasons — lack of preparedness among 
others — she condoned all affronts and drew the 
line at neutrality. 

The country was absolutely unequipped for 
the contest. The Lybian campaign had dis- 
organized Italy's national defences and depleted 
her treasury. Arms, ammunition, uniforms, 
primary necessaries — in a word, the means of 
equipping an army — were lacking. The expen- 
diture of £80,000,000 sterling during the con- 
flict with Turkey rendered the strictest economy 
imperative, and so intent was the Cabinet on 
observing it that the first candidate for the post 
of War Minister declined the honour, because 
of the disproportion between the sum offered 
to him for reorganization and the pressing needs 
of the national defences. 

The outbreak of the present conflict, there- 
fore, took Italy unawares and found her in a 
condition of military unpreparedness which, 
if her participation in the war had been a 
necessity, might have had mischievous con- 
sequences for the nation. Availing herself of 
this condition of affairs and of the pacific tem- 
per of the Italian people, Germany reinforced 
those motives by the prospect of Corsica, Nice, 
Savoy, Tunis and Morocco in return for active 
co-operation. But the active co-operation of 
Italy with Austria and Germany was wholly 
excluded. The people would have vetoed it 
as suicidal. The utmost that could be at- 
tempted was the preservation of her neutrality, 
and that this object would be attained seemed 
a foregone conclusion. 

And it is fair to state that this belief was well 
grounded. When war was declared and Italy 
was summoned to march with her allies against 
France, Britain and Russia, she repudiated her 



194 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

obligation on the ground that the clause in 
their treaty provided for common action in 
defence only, not for co-operation in a war of 
aggression, such as was then about to be 
waged. And that plea could not be rebutted. 
This preliminary dissonance to which the 
Central empires resigned themselves was fol- 
lowed by disputes which turned upon the in- 
terpretation of the compensation clause of the 
Treaty, upon Italy's territorial demands and 
Austria's demurrers. Thus from first to last 
the issues raised were of a diplomatic order, 
and if German statesmen had received carte 
blanche to settle them, it is not improbable 
that a compromise would have been effected 
which would have left the Italian Government 
no choice but to persevere in its neutrality. 

And German statesmen strove hard to wrest 
the matter from their ally and take it into 
their own hands, but were only partially suc- 
cessful. Both they and the Austrians selected 
their most supple and wily diplomatists to 
conduct the difficult negotiations. Prince 
Biilow was appointed German Ambassador to 
King Victor's Government, Baron Macchio 
supplanted Merey in Rome, but the most 
sensational change effected was the substi- 
tution of Baron Burian for Count Berchtold 
in the Austrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 1 
This latter event was construed by the Euro- 
pean public as the foretoken of a new and 
far-resonant departure in Austria's treatment 
of international relations. In reality it was 
hardly more than the withdrawal from public 
business of a tired statesman malgre lui who 
had persistently sought to be relieved of his 
charge ever since his first appointment. Count 
1 January 15, 1915. 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 195 

Berchtold's name is inseparably associated with 
events of the first magnitude for his country 
and for Europe, but on the creation or mould- 
ing of which he had little appreciable part. 
It is hardly too much to say that if, during 
the period while he held office, the Ministry 
of Foreign Affairs had been without a head, 
the mechanism would have worked with no 
serious hitch, and with pretty much the same 
results which we now behold. For he was 
but the intermediary between the mechanism 
and the real minister, who invariably ap- 
peared as a deus ex machina in all the great 
crises of recent years, and who was none other 
than the Emperor Francis Joseph himself. 

Count Berchtold was a continuator. He 
endeavoured under adverse circumstances to 
carry out the feasible schemes of his prede- 
cessor, but the obstacles in his way proved 
insurmountable. He is a straightforward, 
truthful man, and in the best sense of the word 
a gentleman. The greatest achievement to 
which he can point during his tenure of power 
is the disruption of the Balkan League. Having 
had an opportunity of seeing the working of 
the scheme at close quarters, I may say that it 
was ingenious. Pacific by temperament and 
conviction, he co-operated successfully with 
the Emperor to ward off a European conflict 
more than once. But from the day when Count 
Tisza won over Franz Josef to the ideas of 
Kaiser Wilhelm, Count Berchtold's occupation 
was gone. 

His successor, Baron Burian, entered upon 
his office with an established reputation and a 
political programme. But so immersed were 
the Allies in the absurd illusions which ascribed 
disorganization to Germany and discord to 



196 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

the two imperial Governments, that Burian's 
appointment was read by many as an omen 
that Austria-Hungary was already scheming 
for a separate peace. Events soon showed that 
the disorganization was not in Germany nor 
the discord on the side of the Central Empires. 

Meanwhile the Italian Minister of Foreign 
Affairs, Di San Giuliano, had succumbed to a 
painful illness, which, however, did not prevent 
him from writing and reading dispatches down 
to the very eve of his death. 1 His successor 
was Sydney Sonnino, perhaps the most up- 
right, rigid and taciturn man who has ever had 
to receive foreign diplomatists and discourse 
sweet nothings in their ears. Devoid of elo- 
quence, of personal magnetism and of most of 
the arts deemed essential to the professional 
diplomatist, he is a man of culture, eminent 
talents, fervid zeal for the public welfare, 
steady moral courage, and rare personal in- 
tegrity. Pitted against the supple and ver- 
satile Biilow, his influence might be likened to 
that of the austere philosopher gazing at the 
incarnate Lamia. 

Between these two statesmen conversations 
began 2 under favourable auspices. One of the 
conditions to which each of them subscribed 
was the maintenance of rigorous secrecy until 
the end of their labours. And it was ob- 
served religiously until Germany's " neces- 
sity " seemed to call for the violation of the 
pledge, whereupon it was profitably violated. 
Baron Sonnino told the German plenipoten- 
tiary that " the majority of the population 
was in favour of perpetuating neutrality, and 

1 Di San Giuliano died on October 18, 1914. He was 
working for a short time on the 17th. 

2 On December 20, 1914. 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 197 

gave its support to the Government for this 
purpose, provided always that by means of 
neutrality certain national aspirations could be 
realized. 1 Biilow at once scored an important 
point by taking sides with Italy against Austria 
on the disputed question whether Clause VII 
of the Triple Alliance entitled the former 
country to demand compensation for the up- 
setting of the Balkan equilibrium caused by 
Austria's war on Serbia. That view and its 
practical corollaries set the machinery going. 
The Austrian Government abandoned its non 
possumus, and discussed the nature and extent 
of the compensation alleged to be due. But 
it never traversed the distances between words 
and acts. 

One of the many wily devices by which the 
German Ambassador sought to inveigle the 
Consulta into forgoing its right to resort to 
war was employed within three weeks of the 
beginning of negotiations. Biilow confiden- 
tially informed Sonnino that Germany was 
sending Count von Wedel to Vienna to per- 
suade the Cabinet there to cede the Trentino 
to Italy, and asked him whether, if Austria 
acquiesced, it would not be possible to announce 
to the Chamber that the Italian Government 
had already in hand enough to warrant it in 
assuming that the main aspirations of the nation 
would be realized. 2 " Absolutely impossible," 
was Sonnino's reply. But the Dictator Giolitti, 
whom Prince Biilow took into partnership, was 
more confident and pliable. This parliamentary 
leader, whose will was law in his own country 
and whose life-work consisted in eliminating 

1 Italian Green Book, Despatch N. 8. 

2 Italian Green Book, January 14, 1915, Despatch 
N. 11. 



198 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

ethical principles from politics, made known 
his belief — nay, his positive knowledge — that 
by diplomatic negotiations the nation could 
obtain concessions which would dispense it 
from embarking on the war. This pronounce- 
ment had a widespread effect on public opinion, 
confirming the prevalent belief that Austria 
would satisfy Italy's claims. 

There was no means of verifying those 
announcements, for the Rome Government 
scrupulously observed its part of the compact, 
and allowed no news of the progress of the 
conversations to leak out. In fact, it went 
much farther and deprived the Italian people 
systematically of all information on the subject 
of the crisis. Consequently the poisoners of 
the wells of truth had a facile task. 

It was no secret, however, that the cession 
of the Trentino would not suffice to square 
accounts. Italy's land and sea frontiers were 
strategically so exposed that it was sheer im- 
possible to provide adequately for their de- 
fence. And this essential defect rendered the 
nation semi-dependent on its neighbour and 
adversary and powerless to pursue a policy of 
its own. For half a century this dangerous 
flaw in the national edifice and its pernicious 
effects on Italy's international relations had 
been patiently borne with, but Baron Sonnino 
considered that the time for repairing it and 
strengthening the groundwork of peace had 
come. And as he had not the faintest doubt 
that technically as well as essentially he had 
right on his side, he pressed the matter vigor- 
ously. Austrian diplomacy, dense and dilatory 
as ever, argued, protested, temporized. In 
these tactics it was encouraged by the know- 
ledge that Italy was unequipped for war, and 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 199 

by the delusion that the remedial measures of 
reorganization then going forward were only 
make-believe. The Italian Government, on 
the other hand, convinced that nothing worth 
having could be secured by diplomacy until 
diplomacy was backed by force, was labouring 
might and main to raise the army and navy 
to a position as worthy as possible of a Great 
Power and commensurate with the momentous 
issues at stake. 

But the position of the Cabinet was seriously 
weakened by the domestic and insidious enemy. 
Giolitti's pronouncement had provided the 
Austrians with a trump card. For if the 
Dictator accounted the proffered concession 
as a settlement in full, it was obvious that the 
Cabinet, which was composed of his own 
nominees whom he could remove at will, would 
not press successfully for more extensive com- 
pensation. Giolitti was the champion and 
spokesman of the nation, and his estimate of 
its aspirations alone carried weight. And now 
once more the Dictator, acting through his 
parliamentary lieutenants, organized another 
anti-governmental demonstration which humili- 
ated the Cabinet and impaired its authority as 
a negotiator. Of this favourable diversion the 
Austrians availed themselves to the full. But 
gradually it dawned upon them that behind 
the Italian Foreign Minister a reorganized 
Italian army, well equipped and partially 
mobilized, was being arrayed for the eventu- 
ality of a failure of the negotiations. By way 
of recognizing this fact the Ballplatz increased 
its offer, but only very slightly, while it grew 
more and more lavish of arguments. But the 
" principal aspirations of the Italian people " 
had not yet been taken into serious considera- 



200 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

tion by Baron Burian. Down to April 21 
this statesman had not braced himself up to 
offer anything more than the Trentino, which 
Prince Bulow had virtually promised in 
January, and this despite the intimation given 
by the Italian Foreign Secretary, that after the 
long spell of word-weaving and hair-splitting 
he must insist on a serious and immediate 
effort being put forth to meet Italy's demands. 
Thus during five months of tedious negotia- 
tions Austria had contrived to exchange views 
and notes with the Consulta without offering 
any more solid basis for an agreement than 
the cession of a part of the Trentino. It is 
fair to add that even this appeared a generous 
gift to Franz Josef's ministers, who failed to 
see why the Habsburg Monarchy should offer 
any compensation to an ally from whom help, 
not claims, had been expected. To a possible 
abandonment of territory on the Isonzo or 
elsewhere the Vienna Cabinet made no allu- 
sion. On April 8 Sonnino presented counter 
proposals, which he unfolded in nine clauses. 
They comprehended the cession of the Tren- 
tino, including the frontiers established for 
the kingdom of Italy by the Treaty of Paris 
of 1810; a rectification of Italy's eastern 
boundaries, taking in the cities of Gradisca and 
Gorizia ; the transformation of Trieste and its 
territory into an autonomous State, inter- 
nationally independent; the transfer to the 
kingdom of Italy of the Curzolari group of 
islands; all these territories to be delivered 
up on the ratification of the Treaty. Further, 
Italy's full sovereignty over Valona was to 
be recognized by Austria, who should for- 
swear all further designs on Albania and 
concede a full pardon to all persons of those 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 201 

lands undergoing punishment for political or 
military offences. On her side Italy would 
consent to pay 200,000,000 francs as her share 
of the public debt and of other financial obli- 
gations of the provinces in question, to remain 
absolutely neutral during the present war, and 
to renounce all further claims to compensation 
arising out of Clause VII of the Treaty. 1 

Those terms were rejected by the Austrian 
Foreign Minister on grounds which have no 
longer any practical interest. Noteworthy is 
his remark that even in peace time the imme- 
diate consignment of such territory as Austria 
might be willing to abandon would be im- 
possible, and during the prosecution of a tre- 
mendous war it was inconceivable.* From 
this position he had never once swerved during 
the five months' conversations, and he was 
backed by Germany, who on March 19 had 
offered to guarantee the fulfilment of the 
promise after the war. But a fortnight later 
he suddenly changed his ground without really 
yielding the point, by suggesting the creation of 
a mixed commission which should make recom- 
mendations about the ways and means of 
transferring the strips of territory in question. 
But as the labours of this commission were 
not to be restricted in time, and as the amount 
to be ceded fell far short of what was demanded, 
Baron Sonnino negatived the suggestion. 

Then and only then did the Italian Govern- 
ment withdraw their proposals, denounce the 
Triple Alliance, and proclaim Italy's liberty of 
action. 3 

1 Italian Green Book, Dispatch N. 64. 
3 Italian Green Book, Dispatch N. 71, April 16, 1915. 
3 May 3, 1915. Cf. Italian Green Book, Dispatch 
N. 76. 



202 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Of this sensational turn of affairs the European 
public had no inkling. For the Italian Govern- 
ment was bound to reticence by its plighted 
word and the Germans and Austrians by their 
interest, which was to foster the belief that the 
conversations were proceeding successfully and 
that Austria's proposals were welcomed by 
the Consulta. But Italy, thus absolved from 
the ties that had so long linked her with 
Germany and Austria, entered into a con- 
ditional compact with the Powers of the 
Entente. In Paris the secret quickly leaked 
out and was at once communicated to Berlin, 
whose organized espionage continued to 
flourish in the French capital. Thereupon 
Herr Jagow urged Biilow to bestir himself 
without delay. But the Prince was hard set. 
On the Italian Cabinet he had lost his hold. 
It had already crossed the Rubicon and passed 
over to the Entente. True, the Cabinet was 
not Italy, was not even the Government of 
Italy. It was hardly more than a group of 
mere place-warmers for Giolitti and his parti- 
sans. At any moment it could be upset and 
the damage inflicted by Austria's stupidity 
made good. And to effect this was the task to 
which the German Ambassador now addressed 
himself. 

He was admirably qualified to discharge it. 
All Italy, with the exception of a small band 
of nationalists and republicans, was his ally. 
The Pope was ex officio an apostle of peace. A 
large body of the clergy submissively followed 
the Pope. The Vatican and its hangers-on were 
sitting en permanence directing a movement 
which had for its object the prevention of war. 
The parliamentary majority was aggressively 
neutralist. The economic interests of the nation 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 203 

were ranged on the same side. Almost the 
entire aristocracy was enlisted under the flag 
of the German Ambassador, at whose hospitable 
board the scions of the men whose names had 
been honourably associated with the Risorgi- 
mento met and deliberated. As yet, there- 
fore, nothing was lost to the Central Empires ; 
only a difficulty had been created which would 
serve as a welcome foil to impart sharper re- 
lief to Prince Billow's certain victory. The 
man whose co-operation would win this victory 
was the Dictator Giolitti, and him the Am- 
bassador summoned to Rome. 

Now Giolitti was acquainted with every- 
thing that had been done by the Cabinet, 
including his country's covenant with the 
Allies, and he disapproved of it. He was 
also initiated by Biilow into the scheme by 
which that covenant was to be set aside and 
Italy made to break her faith, and he signified 
his approbation of it. Nay, this patriot went 
further; he undertook to aid and abet Biilow 
in his well-thought-out plot. It had been 
resolved by the German Ambassador, as soon 
as he learned that Italy had taken an irre- 
vocable decision and denounced the Treaty of 
Alliance, that he would amend the proposals 
which he himself, in Austria's name, had put 
forward as the utmost limit to which she was 
prepared to go; and he was anxious, before 
offering them officially, to ascertain whether 
Italy's Dictator would accept them and guar- 
antee their acceptance by his parliamentary 
majority. 

That was the object for which Giolliti's 
presence was needed in Rome. The amended 
proposals were typewritten and distributed by 
Erzberger, the leader of the German Catholic 



204 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

parliamentary party, who was an over-zealous 
agent of the Wilhelmstrasse and a persona grata 
at the Vatican. He, a German, had gone to 
Rome to bestir the neutralists and lead the 
movement against the Italian Government. 
His leaflets containing the belated concessions 
were given to Giolitti and his lieutenants. I 
received a copy myself, and sent it to the Daily 
Telegraph. The concessions were actually pub- 
lished in that journal and communicated to 
the British public before King Victor's Govern- 
ment, to whom Prince Biilow was accredited, 
had any cognizance of their existence. That 
this procedure involved a gross breach of the 
covenant between the Ambassador and Son- 
nino stipulating the maintenance of absolute 
secrecy was deemed an irrelevant consideration. 
Seldom in modern times have such under- 
hand methods been resorted to by the Govern- 
ment of a Great Power. Neither would it be 
easy to find an example of a responsible states- 
man behaving as Giolitti behaved and working 
in collusion with the Government of a State 
which at the time was virtually his country's 
enemy. This statesman, however, duly played 
the part assigned to him in this intrigue 
against his Government and country, and 
the success of his scheme would have left 
the Italian nation covered with infamy and 
bereft of friends. For if he had been able 
to conclude the compact with Austria as he 
had undertaken to do, his country would have 
been left to the mercy of his Austro-German 
masters, who despise Italy, and probably, if 
victorious, would have refused to redeem their 
promises, while the Entente States would have 
boycotted her as faithless and false-hearted. 
As a dilemma for Italy the position in which 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 205 

she was placed must have delighted the wily 
Biilow. How it can have satisfied an Italian 
statesman is a psychological riddle. 

Meanwhile the German Ambassador pre- 
sented officially Austria's final proposals, as 
though the conversations on this subject had 
not been broken off. Baron Sonnino refused 
to discuss them. But the Dictator intended 
that his word should be heard and his will 
should be done. To the King and the Premier, 
Giolitti announced that, despite all that had 
been accomplished by the Government, he still 
clung to the belief that Austria's new conces- 
sions offered a basis for further negotiations, 
which, if cleverly conducted, would lead to 
the acquisition of some other strips of territory, 
and would certainly culminate in a satisfactory 
settlement. 

But, not satisfied with this confidential ex- 
pression of opinion, Giolitti let it be known to 
the whole nation that he, the chief and spokes- 
man of the parliamentary majority, was con- 
vinced of the feasibility of an accord with 
Austria on the basis of her last offer, which 
he deemed acceptable in principle ; that he saw 
no motives for plunging Italy into a hideous 
war, which would involve the nation in disaster ; 
and that he would adjust his acts to these 
convictions. 

This deliberate pronouncement, coming from 
the most prominent man in the country, had 
a powerful effect upon his followers and also 
upon the public at large. No nation desires 
war for war's sake, and the interpretation put 
upon Giolitti's words by the extreme neutral- 
ists and, in particular, by the insincere organs 
of the Vatican, was that he had seen enough 
to convince him that the Cabinet had decided 



206 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

to wage war against Germany and Austria 
at all costs and irrespective of the nation's 
interests. Giolitti's parliamentary friends de- 
monstratively called upon him at his private 
residence, leaving their cards, and announcing 
the conformity of their views to those of their 
leader; and as their number, which was care- 
fully communicated to the Press, formed the 
majority of the Chamber, the Cabinet felt 
impelled to take the hint and act upon it. 
This was the only course open to it. For, as 
the ministers were obliged to meet Parliament 
on May 20 — the day fixed for its reopening — 
they were sure to be out-voted on a division, 
whereupon a crisis, not merely ministerial but 
national and international, would be precipi- 
tated. The consequences of such a conflict 
might be disastrous. Rather than wait for 
this eventuality the Cabinet tendered its resig- 
nation. Thus Biilow had seemingly triumphed. 
The Government was turned out by Giolitti, 
who had accepted in advance the Austro- 
German terms of a settlement, and Italy was 
seemingly won over to the Teutons. 

So far as one could judge, the fate of the 
nation was now decided. Its course was 
marked out for it, and was henceforward un- 
alterable. For, so far as one could see, by no 
section of the constitutional machinery was 
the strategy of Bulow and Giolitti to be 
thwarted. In a parliamentary land the legis- 
latures are paramount, and here both Chamber 
and Senate were arrayed against the Cabinet 
for Giolitti and Germany. 

The ferment consequent upon this turn of 
affairs was tremendous. All Europe was astir 
with excitement. The Press of Berlin and 
Vienna was jubilant. Panegyrics of Giolitti 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 207 

and of Biilow filled the columns of their daily 
Press. 

But a deus ex machina suddenly descended 
upon the scene in the unwonted form of 
an indignant nation. The Italian people, 
which had at first been either indifferent or 
actively in favour of cultivating neighbourly 
relations with Germany, had of late been 
following the course of the struggle with the 
liveliest interest. Germany's dealings with 
Belgium had impressed them deeply. Her 
methods of warfare had estranged their sym- 
pathies. Her doctrine of the supremacy of 
force and falsehood had given an adverse 
poise to their ideas and leanings. Deep 
into their hearts had sunk the tidings of 
the destruction of the Lusitania, awakening 
feelings of loathing and abomination for its 
authors, to which free expression was now 
being given everywhere. The spirit that actu- 
ated this revolting enormity was brand-marked 
as that of demoniacal fury loosed from moral 
control and from the ties that bind nations and 
individuals to all humanity. 

The effect upon public sentiment and opinion 
in Italy, where emotions are tensely strung, 
and sympathy with suffering is more flexible 
and diffusive than it is even among the other 
Latin races, was instantaneous. One states- 
man, who was a partisan of neutrality, remarked 
to me that German " Kultur," as revealed 
during the present war, is dissociated from 
every sense of duty, obligation, chivalry, 
honour, and is become a potent poison which 
the remainder of humanity must endeavour 
by all efficacious methods to banish from the 
international system. 

" This," he went on, "is no longer war; it 



208 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

is organized slaughter, perpetrated by a race 
suffering from dog-madness. I tremble at 
the thought that our own civilized and 
chivalrous people may at any moment be 
confronted with this lava flood of savagery and 
destructiveness. Now, if ever, the opportune 
moment has come for all civilized nations to 
join in protest, stiffened with a unanimous 
threat, against the continuance of such crimes 
against the human race. Europe ought surely 
to have the line drawn at the poisoning of 
wells, the persecution of prisoners, and the 
massacre of women and children. If a pro- 
posal to this effect were made, I myself would 
second it with ardour." * 

These pent-up feelings now found vent in a 
series of meetings and demonstrations against 
Germany as well as Austria and their Italian 
allies. Italy's spiritual heritage from the old 
Romans asserted itself in impressive forms 
and unwonted ways, and the conscience of 
the nation loudly affirmed its claim to be the 
main directing force in a crisis where the 
honour and the future of the country were at 
stake. And within four days of this purga- 
tive process a marked change was noticeable. 
Giolitti's partisans — hissed, jostled, mauled, 
frightened out of their lives — lay low. Many 
of them publicly recanted and proclaimed their 
conversion to intervention. The chief of the 
German Catholic party and friend of the 
Vatican, Erzberger, was driven from his hotel 
to the German Embassy as a foreign mis- 
chief-maker, contrabandist and spy. Some of 
the Press organs, subsidized or created by 
the Teutons, were obliged to disappear. The 
honest neutralist journals, yielding to the 
1 Cf. Daily Telegraph, May 10, 1915. 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 209 

nation, veered round to the fallen Cabinet. 
In a word, the political atmosphere, theretofore 
foul and mephitic, became suddenly charged 
with purer, healthier elements — Billow's plot 
was thwarted and Giolitti's role played out. 
The Salandra-Sonnino Cabinet was borne back 
to office on the crest of this national wave, 
and Italy declared war against Austria. But 
only against Austria. For the Cabinet, re- 
stored to power, became a cautious steward, 
and took to imitating him of the Gospel who 
hid his talents instead of augmenting them. 

This restriction of military operations to the 
Habsburg Monarchy struck many observers as 
singular. In truth the motives that inspired 
the Government have never been authorita- 
tively divulged. That every Italian Cabinet 
since Crispi's days had made a marked distinc- 
tion between Germany and Austria was notori- 
ous. That Di San Giuliano felt as strongly 
attracted towards Berlin as he was repelled by 
Vienna may be gathered from the official but 
still unpublished dispatches that exist on the 
subject. But that in a war not of two indi- 
vidual nations, but of groups of States, one — 
and only one — of these should be singled out 
as the object of aggression aroused something 
more than mere curiosity. And this feeling 
was intensified when it became known that 
on the eve of the diplomatic rupture Biilow, 
ever on the alert for the interests of his country, 
had induced the Italian Government to con- 
clude a convention with Germany for the pro- 
tection of private property in case of active 
hostilities. For Germany possesses in Italy 
property valued at several milliards of francs, 
whereas Italy claims as her own almost nothing in 
the German empire. Who can read the riddle ? 



210 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

The adhesion of Italy to the Allies may be 
noted as perhaps the most important political 
event of the year, while the circumstances in 
which it was decided on dispel all doubt that 
the Italian people were actuated by lofty 
motives and rose to the highest ideas involved 
in the European conflict, and that the Cabinet's 
ideals were nowise identical with those of the 
nation. It is alleged by certain personal 
friends of Baron Sonnino, who had exception- 
ally good opportunities for knowing what took 
place — and I have grounds for acquiescing in 
their view — that this statesman was for de- 
claring war against Germany as well as Austria, 
but that Professor Salandra negatived this 
logical and straightforward move. 

That the Salandra Cabinet damaged the 
cause of Italy by thus endeavouring to 
blow hot and cold, is a fact which its warmest 
supporters no longer call in question. They 
now merely plead for extenuating circum- 
stances on the ground that the damage was 
done unwittingly. " It would be unjust," 
the Nationalist Federzoni said in a speech 
delivered before the Chamber on March 16, 1 
" to accuse the Italian Government of dis- 
loyalty or insincerity, but none the less the 
treaty it concluded with Germany has proved 
superlatively baleful to the country." Like 
the other allied peoples, the Italian nation 
has been served by a Cabinet which defeated 
many of the objects it was striving after. 

Studying Italian politics since the war broke 
out is like threading the Cretan Labyrinth in 
a dense fog. The fog, curiously enough, which 
now seldom lifts, would seem to form an in- 
tegral part of the politics. For one of the 
1 March 16, 1916. 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 211 

maxims of the present chief of the Consulta, 
Baron Sonnino, is that secrecy is the soul of 
efficacy. And as thoroughness marks his 
action whenever it is quite free, the mystery 
that enwraps the schemes and designs of King 
Victor's Government is become impenetrable. 
One may form a faint notion of the stringency 
with which this un-Italian occultism is ob- 
served by the eminent Jewish statesman, from 
the circumstance that during the crisis that 
preceded the war, only one of his colleagues 
was kept informed of the progress of the con- 
versations with Austria, and that was his 
own chief, Professor Salandra. As for the 
nation at large, it was so out of touch with 
the Government, and so led astray concerning 
the trend of events, that for months it con- 
fidently anticipated an accord with the Central 
Empires. Again, down to the day on which 
Baron Sonnino read out his last declaration in 
the Chamber (Dec. 1), officials of the Ministry 
had rigorous instructions not to give any one 
even a hint as to whether Italy would or 
would not sign the London Convention, re- 
nouncing the right to conclude a separate 
peace. 

For a long time previously Italy's aloofness 
had preoccupied the Entente, and to the 
accord between the two there continued to 
be something lacking. The Italian Govern- 
ment, dissatisfied with the degree of help 
received from Great Britain, was not slow 
to indicate it in official conversations with 
our Ambassador. Happily, the silence of our 
Foreign Office and the secrecy of Baron 
Sonnino concealed the rifts of the lute until 
most of them were said to be repaired. In the 
meantime Italy persisted in concentrating on 



212 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

the Isonzo and the Carso all her efforts to help 
the Allies against the Turks and the Bulgars. 
The expeditions to the Dardanelles, Salonika 
and Serbia evoked her moral sympathy, but 
could not secure her military co-operation. 
The generosity of the Entente, and of Britain 
in particular, towards Greece was an additional 
stumbling-block, and the offer of Cyprus to 
King Constantine an abomination in her eyes. 

That Italy's impolitic aloofness could not 
last, without impairing the worth of her sacri- 
fices, was obvious. And the extent to which 
co-operation could be stipulated and the com- 
pensations to which that would entitle her, 
formed the subjects of long and delicate con- 
versations between the interested Govern- 
ments. For, naturally enough, Baron Sonnino, 
whose domestic critics are many and ruthless, 
was desirous of getting all he could in the 
Eastern Mediterranean and Asia Minor, while 
measuring out with patriotic closeness the 
military and naval help to be given in return 
— Italy's position, economic, financial and stra- 
tegic, differing considerably from that of the 
other Great Powers. It was not until the 
end of November 1915 that these negotiations 
were worked out to an issue ; and on the 30th 
King Victor's Government signed the Con- 
vention of London, undertaking not to conclude 
a separate peace. 

The gist of this supplementary accord, in 
so far as it imposes fresh obligations upon 
Italy, was communicated to the Chamber by 
Baron Sonnino. It provided for the organiza- 
tion of relief for the Serbian troops in Albania, 
and for other auxiliary expeditions to places 
on the Adriatic coast. But it leaves intact 
the essential and standing limitations to Italy's 



THE POSITION OF ITALY 218 

military and naval co-operation which had to 
be reckoned with theretofore. And these may 
be summarized as follows : King Victor's 
Government, while examining every proposal 
coming from the Allies on its political merits, 
must be guided by the military and naval 
experts of the nation whenever it is a question 
of despatching troops or warships to take 
part in a common enterprise. Italy's first 
care is to hinder an invasion of her territory. 
The next object of her solicitude is to husband 
her naval and other resources and cultivate 
caution. Lastly, the extent of her contri- 
bution to an expedition must be adjusted to 
her resources, which are much more slender 
than those of any other Great Power, and 
are best known to her own rulers. And her 
financial means are to be reinforced by con- 
tributions from Great Britain. 

Those, in brief, are some of the lines on which 
the latest agreement has been concluded. 



CHAPTER XVI 

ROUMANIA AND GREECE 

That Roumania would now take the field 
was a proposition which, after the many and 
emphatic assurances volunteered by her own 
official chiefs, was accepted almost universally. 
She had received considerable help from the 
Allies towards her military preparations. Her 
senators and deputies had fraternized with 
Italians and Frenchmen and her diplomatists 
had been in frequent and friendly communica- 
tion with those of France, Britain and Russia. 
Even statesmen had allowed themselves to be 
persuaded by words and gestures which it 
now appears were meant only to be condi- 
tional assurances or social lubricants. The 
Serbian Premier, for instance, whose shrewd- 
ness is proverbial, exclaimed to an Italian 
journalist, in the second half of June : " Rou- 
mania cannot but follow the example set her 
by Italy. Indeed, you may telegraph to your 
journal that Roumania' s entry into the arena 
is a question of days and it may be only of 
hours. Of this many foretokens have come 
to our knowledge." x But the optimists who 
had drawn practical conclusions from Rou- 
manian promises and friendships lost sight of 
the difference between their own mentality 
and that of the Balkan peoples. They also 
failed to make due allowance for the influ- 

1 Giornale d' Italia, June 19, 1915. Corner e delta Sera, 
June 20, 1915. 

214 



ROUMANIA AND GREECE 215 

ence of German interpenetration, the power of 
German gold, and the deterrent effect of Ger- 
man victories. And above all, they left out 
of consideration the really decisive question 
of military prospects as conditioned by stra- 
tegical position and supplies of munitions. 

The party of intervention, however, was 
still active and full of ardour. Its chief, Take 
Jonescu, is not merely Roumania's only states- 
man, but has established a claim to rank as 
one of the prominent public men of the present 
generation. Unluckily he has long been out 
of office, and his party is condemned to the 
Cassandra role of uttering true prophecies 
which find no credence among those who wield 
the power of putting them to good account. 
M. Bratiano's appropriate attitude may be 
described as statuesque. Occasionally his 
Press organs commented upon the manifesta- 
tions of the interventionists in words barbed 
with bitter sarcasm and utilitarian maxims. 
" Roumania's blood and money," the Inde- 
pendence Ronmaine explained, " must be spent 
only in the furtherance of Roumania's in- 
terest." Her cause must be dissociated from 
that of the belligerents. To this Take Jonescu 
replied x that it is precisely for the good of 
Roumania that her interest should not be 
separated from that of the Entente Powers in 
the conflict. For on the issue of this conflict 
depends the state-system of Europe and also 
the future of Roumania. If the Germans are 
triumphant, he added, force and falsehood will 
triumph with them, the State will acquire 
omnipotence, the individual sink into serfdom. 
Neutrality during a war with such issues is, 
therefore, the height of political unwisdom. 
1 La Rou?nanie, July 26, 1915. 



216 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Greece, after Venizelos's retirement, returned 
to the narrow creed and foolish pranks of her 
unregenerate days, sinking deeper into anarchy. 
More than once in her history she had been 
saved from her enemies and once from her 
friends, but from her own self there is no 
saviour. 

As soon as the Kaiser's paladin, King 
Constantine, had dismissed his pilot and taken 
supreme command of the Ship of State, the 
portals of the realm were thrown open to 
German machinations. The weaver in chief 
of these was Wilhelm's confidential agent, 
Baron Schenk. According to his own pub- 
lished biography, this gentleman had in youth 
been the friend of the two sisters of Princess 
Battenberg, the Grand Duchess Serge and of 
the Russian Tsaritza. He had served in the 
German army, become the representative of 
the firm of Krupps, and been received at the 
German court. While Venizelos was in office, 
Baron Schenk flourished in the shade, but as 
soon as the Germanophile Gounaris took over 
the reins of power, the secret agent went boldly 
forward into the limelight and became the 
public chief of a party, received openly his 
helpmates and partisans, distributed roles and 
money and set frankly to work to " smash 
Venizelos." 

King Constantine's protracted and strange 
malady hindered the Queen, who is the 
Kaiser's sister, from receiving visits. Even 
the wives of ministers were denied access to 
her Majesty. But the baron was an excep- 
tion. He called on her almost every day. 
Cabinet Ministers consulted him. Journalists 
received directions, articles and bribes from 
him. And when the elections were coming 



ROUMANIA AND GREECE 217 

on every venal man of influence who could 
damage Venizelos or help his antagonists was 
bought with hard cash. In order to defeat 
some Venizelist candidates whose return would 
have been particularly distressing, the Baron 
is said to have spent six hundred thousand 
francs. 1 And it is held that the results ob- 
tained by these means were well worth the 
money spent. For the parliamentary opposi- 
tion was strong and aggressive, and some of 
its more active members had imbibed Hellenic 
patriotism from the German Schenk. They 
have since been toiling and moiling to dis- 
qualify Venizelos permanently from office on 
the ground that he is a republican, and that 
the destinies of monarchy would not be safe in 
his hands. By these means German organiza- 
tion, which finds work and room for kings and 
for poisoners, for theologians and assassins, 
has transformed Greece into a Prussian satrapy 
which avails itself of the freedom of the seas, 
established by the Allies, to carry on contraband 
to their detriment and give help and encourage- 
ment to Austrians, Bulgars and Turks. And 
the Turks were meanwhile extirpating the 
Greeks of the coast of Asia Minor. 

Bulgaria's attitude underwent no momentous 
change during the interval that elapsed between 
the outbreak of the war and the close of the 
first year. Symptoms of a new orientation 
had, it is true, often been signalled and com- 
mented, but Ferdinand of Coburg and his 
lieutenants remained steadfastly faithful to the 
policy of quiescence which had conferred more 
substantial benefits on Germany and Austria 
than could have been bestowed by the active 

1 Gazette de Lausanne, July 6, 1915, and Corriere delta 
Sera, July 8, 1915. 



218 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

co-operation of the whole Bulgarian army. This 
tremendous effect could never have been ob- 
tained if Bulgaria had entirely broken with 
the Powers of the Entente. It seemed as 
essential to its success that these should never 
wholly give up the hope of winning her over, 
as it was that her important movements should 
be conducive to the interests of their enemies. 
Hence every secret arrangement with Berlin 
and Vienna was emphatically denied, and every 
overt accord declared to be devoid of political 
significance. 

It was thus that Europe was directed to 
construe the negotiations between the Sofia 
Cabinet and the Austro-German financial syndi- 
cate respecting the payment of an instalment 
of the £20,000,000 loan contracted shortly 
before the war. That Germany, whose finan- 
cial ventures are invariably combined with 
political designs, would not part with her 
money to Bulgaria at a moment when gold is 
scarce, unless she were sure of an adequate 
political return, could not be gainsaid. And 
that the retention by Bulgaria of her freedom 
of action would be incompatible with the 
interests of Austria and Germany is also mani- 
fest. However this may be, the twenty millions 
sterling demanded by Sofia were accorded, 
and the legend was launched that the trans- 
action was purely financial. 

Towards the end of July 1 King Ferdinand's 
ministers made another momentous move, the 
consequences of which cut deep into the poli- 
tical situation. A convention was signed in 
Stamboul between the Turkish and Bulgarian 
Governments by which the former ceded to 
Bulgaria the Turkish section of the Dedeagatch 
1 July 22, 1915. 



ROUMANIA AND GREECE 219 

railway — that is to say, the whole line that runs 
on Turkish territory, together with the stations 
of Dimotika, Kulela-Burgas, and Karagatch. 
The new boundary ran thenceforward parallel 
to the river Maritza, all the territory eastward 
of that becoming Bulgarian. 

And this concession, King Ferdinand's 
ministers would have Europe believe, was 
devoid of political bearings. It was merely 
a case of something being given for nothing. 
And the Allies allowed themselves to be per- 
suaded that this was the real significance of 
the deal. The German Press was more frank. 
It announced that the relations between Bul- 
garia and Turkey had entered upon a decisive 
phase and that all fear of Bulgaria's taking 
part in the war on the side of the Allies had 
been definitely dispelled. 

The Bulgarian problem throughout all that 
wearisome crisis, which ended by Ferdinand 
throwing off the mask, was in reality simple, 
and the known or verifiable facts ought to have 
been sufficient to bring the judgment of the 
Entente statesmen to conclusions which would 
have enabled them to steer clear of the costly 
blunders that characterized their policy. The 
line of action followed from first to last by 
Ferdinand was supremely inelastic : only its 
manifestations, of which the object was to 
deceive, were varied and conflicting. It was 
bound up with Austria's undertaking to re- 
store Macedonia to Bulgaria and to main- 
tain Ferdinand on the throne. This twofold 
promise was the bait by which the king was 
caught and kept in Austria's toils, while the 
Bulgarian people was moved by patriotism 
to identify its cause with that of Ferdinand. 
And the arrangement was to my knowledge 



220 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

completed before the opening of the European 
war. Evidence of its existence was forth- 
coming, but the statesmen of the Entente, who 
allowed preconceived notions to overrule the 
testimony of their senses, declined to accept 
it. Since then the Bulgarian Cabinet, in the 
person of the Premier, has publicly admitted 
the truth of my reiterated statement. In a 
public speech, delivered in March 1916, "M. 
Radoslavoff confessed that Bulgaria had en- 
tered the war by reason of certain obligations 
which she had assumed." * 

But there was another safe test which the 
Entente Governments could have applied with 
profit to the situation. Interest was obviously 
the mainspring of the Bulgarian nation by 
whomsoever it might chance to be repre- 
sented. It would be inconsistent with the 
conception of international politics to assume 
any other. Now that interest, it was obvious, 
could be so fully and rapidly furthered by the 
Central Empires, and in the judgment of the 
Bulgars with such finality and at the cost of 
so few sacrifices, that it was sheer impossible 
for the Entente Governments to attempt to 
compete with those. Bulgaria demanded im- 
mediate possession of Central Macedonia and 
the permanent weakening of the Serbian State. 
And this the Central Empires promised to 
effect within a few weeks from Bulgaria's entry 
into the war. Moreover, while asking that 
she should take part in a struggle against that 
group of belligerents which she deemed by far 
the weaker, they undertook to give her the 
full support of the two greatest military 
Powers in the world. 

1 Cf. Daily Telegraph, March 14, 1916, in telegram 
from Athens. 



ROUMANIA AND GREECE 221 

Consider the difference between that arrange- 
ment and the attractions provided by the 
Entente. Russia, France and Britain could 
deal only in counters, not in hard cash like 
their adversaries. The utmost they were able 
to offer was an undertaking to use their good 
offices with Serbia and Greece to obtain the 
promise of a part of Bulgaria's demands. 
And the fulfilment of this promise would of 
necessity be conditional on the victory of the 
Allies. As for the weakening of Serbia, it 
could not be entertained. On the contrary, 
that State, according to the Entente scheme, 
would be greatly enlarged, would, in fact, 
become by far the greatest of the Balkan 
nations. And for this shadowy lure, Bulgaria 
was expected to meet in deadly encounter the 
greatest military empires the world has ever 
seen, and to meet them without the help of 
any of the Great Powers of the Entente. 

One has but to compare these two alterna- 
tives in order to realize that, even if Ferdinand 
had entered into no binding compact with 
Austria and Germany, he would not hesitate 
a moment between them. Personally and 
politically he was held tight by the Teuton 
tentacles. 

The currency of the notion that with these 
competing offers before him, a crafty states- 
man like Ferdinand who felt over and above 
that Russia's vengeance was hanging over his 
head, would take what he believed was the 
losing side, shows a degree of naivete which 
cannot be qualified without epithets which it 
had better be understood than expressed. 

Looking back upon the results of the first 
twenty months of the war and upon the 
more obvious causes to which they may 



222 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

fairly be ascribed, one is struck less forcibly 
by the military and economic unpreparedness 
of the Allies for the inevitable conflict than 
by their inaccessibility to the ground ideas 
on which Germany set her hopes of success. 
The two groups of belligerents stood intel- 
lectually on different planes. The Teuton's 
faith was implicit in the law of causality, 
in the necessity of contemplating the vast 
problem as a whole, of adjusting means 
to ends, of co-operation at home and co- 
ordination of means abroad. The methods 
of the Allies were drawn from a limited range 
of experience which was no longer applicable 
to the new conditions, and their hopes rested 
on a series of isolated exertions put forth tem- 
porarily under stress of exceptional pressure. 

They made noble sacrifices for the cause 
of liberty and justice. Pacific by tempera- 
ment and conviction, they resignedly accepted 
military discipline as a temporary expedient, 
a purgatorial ordeal, and went about the 
while with a sense of displacement, the longing 
of exiles to get back. Spurred by stress of 
circumstance, they achieved more than fore- 
sight and insight had led them to design but 
far less than their optimism had encouraged 
them to anticipate. Step by step they were 
driven by hard reality to widen their angle of 
vision, to extend their schemes, and to concert 
certain measures in common. The meeting 
of the three Finance Ministers in Paris was 
followed by the Councils of the allied generals, 
by the combined expedition to the Dardanelles, 
and by the nationalization of the manufacture 
of munitions in each of the allied countries. And 
all these innovations were moves in the right 
direction. But they were made as temporary 



ROUMANIA AND GREECE 228 

expedients under pressure of outward events, 
and it is still to the future that one looks for 
tokens of statesmanlike intuition which from 
a comprehensive survey of the problem in its 
entirety will draw the materials wherewith to 
weave a coherent scheme of general action and 
permanent co-operation. 

Events travelled fast in the month of July 
1915, and their effect on the Allies was depress- 
ing. In Russia the Austro-Germans were ad- 
vancing steadily against Riga and Warsaw, 
where a battle which experts accounted the 
most sanguinary and momentous in the war 
was approaching a decision. A fatal bar being 
placed by Russia's reverses and other untoward 
occurrences to the realization of the hopes 
that had been raised by Kitchener's army, 
the French, headed by M. Pichon and backed 
by the Russian Press, once more mooted the 
vexed question of Japanese intervention. In 
the Turkish dominions the Greeks were sub- 
jected to relentless persecution, especially on 
the coast of Asia Minor. The massacre of 
Armenians on an unprecedented scale was 
reported from Bitlis, Moosh, Diarbekir and 
Zeitun. In the first-named region 9,000 
bodies, mostly women and children, were, it is 
alleged, cast into the river Tigris. 1 The Swedish 
Premier, by an enigmatic speech in which the 
doctrine of neutrality at all costs was ostenta- 
tiously repudiated, aroused suspicion of an inten- 
tion on the part of his Government to join the 
Teutons in order to weaken the Slav neighbour, 
and to this apprehension colour was imparted 
by the tardy announcement that since the 
outbreak of the war Sweden had increased her 
army from 360,000 to 500,000 men. In the 
1 Novoye Vremya, July 22, 1915. 



224 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

United States mysterious " accidents " and 
mishaps occurred on board warships and in 
munitions and arms manufactories, and strikes 
were organized by Germans and Austrians on 
a scale which attracted the serious attention 
of the Washington Government. 

But the last month of that fateful year was 
further darkened by the most dangerous and 
ominous event recorded in the United King- 
dom since the war began. Over 200,000 coal 
miners of South Wales deliberately, obstinately 
and criminally withheld their labour from 
their own nation, whose existence at that 
moment was dependent on its bestowal. The 
coal pits of South Wales remained idle for 
over a week. The miners crossed their arms 
and turned deaf ears to the voice of reason 
and interest calling on them not to sacrifice 
the lives of their kith and kin who were fighting 
for them. This act of black treason to the 
country had been foreseen and foretold months 
before, but out of consideration for the rights of 
individuals was allowed to take place. The 
Germans and Austrians were exultant, for 
another couple of weeks' strike would have given 
them the victory. Already the collapse of our 
defence was become a definite eventuality. The 
tact and statesmanship of Mr. Lloyd George 
exorcised the redoubtable spectre, but the spirit 
which that piece of treason revealed filled the 
most sanguine with dread and set those of little 
faith asking themselves whether this lamentable 
phenomenon was not one of certain ill-boding 
symptoms which seemed to reveal the smoothly 
moving current that bears doomed nations 
onward to their fate. 

Certainly nothing could put in a clearer 
light than that strike has done the peremptory 



ROUMANIA AND GREECE 225 

necessity of national discipline, at any rate 
in war-time. The State that is unable to 
command the service of all its citizens when 
beset by ruthless foreign enemies has lost its 
lease of life and its right to live. It must be 
recognized that patriotism is still an unknown 
sentiment among millions of those who are 
citizens of the United Kingdom and Ireland. 
Patriotism has never been systematically in- 
culcated among us as in Germany, France and 
Russia. Parochial or at most party interests 
still mark the loftiest heights to which certain 
sections of the population can soar above the 
dead level of individual egotism. In Germany 
and Austria strikes during war are unthinkable. 
Every railway official, every tram-conductor, 
every artisan there is a soldier subject to 
military discipline and is expected to give 
the fullest measure of his productive powers 
to the nation. And it is fair to add that they 
all regard this duty as a signal honour and a 
source of pleasure. For to them patriotism 
is a religion and their country a divinity. 

The depth and fervour of this self-denying 
spirit among them as contrasted with the 
" healthy individual egotism " of the Allies 
constitutes one of the most disquieting pheno- 
mena of the struggle. Austria has been scoffed 
at for her abject submissiveness to Germany. 
But there is another way of looking at her 
attitude. She has courageously effaced her in- 
dividuality more completely even than Turkey 
for the sake of the common cause. And 
she has lost nothing by the painful effort. 
Her various peoples who were expected to be 
tearing each other to pieces have given us a 
splendid example of discipline and self-abnega- 
tion. In the Skoda works at Pilsen, where 



226 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

machine guns are made, fifteen thousand 
workmen are cheerfully toiling and moiling 
every day of the week, Sundays and holidays 
not excepted. Since the war began Germany 
has accomplished as great things at home as 
on foreign battlefields. She built and launched 
a Dreadnought of 25,600 tons, a line-of-battle 
ship of 26,200 tons. And while the latter 
vessel was on the stocks, the reports published 
in the British press of the splendid results 
obtained by the 15-inch guns of the Queen 
Elizabeth moved the German Admiralty to 
substitute these for the 12-inch guns already 
adopted. Two swift cruisers, 12 small sub- 
marines and 24 larger ones of 1200 tons dis- 
placement, with a speed of 16 knots under 
water, 20 on the surface and a radius of action 
of 3000 miles — were among the results of a 
single year's activity. 



CHAPTER XVII 

Germany's resourcefulness 

And our enemies' resourcefulness and power 
of adaptation is of a piece with their capacity 
for work. When war was declared and foreign 
trade arrested, numerous German factories 
underwent a quick transformation. Silk- 
works began to turn out bandages and lint; 
velvet works produced materials for tents; 
umbrella makers took to manufacturing rain- 
proof cloth; the output of sewing-machine 
factories was changed to shrapnel; piano 
manufacturers became makers of cartridges. 
Paper producers supplied the War Office with 
paper-made blankets. For copper, when the 
supply began to grow short, nickelled iron 
was quickly substituted. Sugar was em- 
ployed to obtain the spirit which had to take 
the place of benzine. And the upshot of these 
transformations is that the orders received 
for military needs exceed those which would 
in normal conditions of exportation have been 
placed by foreign customers with German 
industry. The goods traffic on German rail- 
ways, which had fallen to 41 per cent, during 
the first month of the war, has since gone up 
to 96 per cent. Those achievements are not 
merely noteworthy in themselves, they are 
ominously symptomatic. 

A German professor, writing to a friend im- 
prisoned in France, commented in passing 

227 



228 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

upon these qualifications of his countrymen in 
a letter which M. Joseph Reinach soon after- 
wards gave to the public. One passage in that 
document is worth quoting. The professor 
holds that even if the worst comes to the worst, 
Germany can always conclude a " white 
peace " which will leave her the formidable 
glory of having held the whole world in check, 
will consolidate her prestige in Europe and 
enable her, twenty years hence, when she has 
made good her losses, to establish permanently 
her dominion. " My confidence is based on 
German patriotism, on German sense of dis- 
cipline, on German genius for organization. 
But it is founded above all else on our enemies' 
incapacity for organization. Ah, if our ad- 
versaries could enhance the worth of their 
resources by acquiring our gifts of initiative 
and method, we should be lost ! I am thrilled 
by the picture of what we could accomplish 
if we were in the places of the English and the 
French and by the thought of the danger that 
would confront us if they but knew how to 
utilize the force of their allies as we have 
availed ourselves of those of Austria and 
Turkey." 

Those reflections find their fairest comment 
in the events of the twenty months that 
have passed since the opening of the campaign. 

Our enemies' reading of those events is 
instructive. The Austrian Press hails them 
as satisfactory. Even the Socialist organ x 
declares that, in the qualities that go to the 
attainment of success, " Austria holds the first 
place." The Austrian General Staff wrote eight 
months ago : " Our troops have now been 
fighting for a twelvemonth. ... A whole world 
1 Arbeiter Zeitung. 



GERMANY'S RESOURCEFULNESS 229 

of enemies rose up against the Central Empires, 
and more than once our army had to bear the 
brunt of their formidable onslaught. To-day, 
they hold but small tracts of territory in western 
Galicia and Alsatia, whereas Germany's hand 
is closed in a tight grasp on Belgium and 
the richest provinces of France, and in the 
north-east the allied forces of Austria and 
Germany have penetrated well into Russian 
Poland. The cannons' muzzles are turned 
against the most powerful fortresses of the 
Tsar, and in the Dardanelles our third ally 
keeps watch and ward imperturbably." 

The War Lord himself has recorded his 
estimate of the results of the first year's 
campaign. " Germany," he stated in a speech 
delivered at Lemberg, "is an impregnable 
fortress. In her forward march she is irre- 
sistible. She will prove to the world that she 
can overcome all her enemies and will dictate 
to them the peace terms that please herself." 
And in a discourse pronounced at Beuthen 
he recorded his view of the Allies' outlook in 
these words : " Our enemies are floundering 
in confusion. Among themselves they are not 
united. They are disorganized by the struggle, 
disheartened by the knowledge that they are 
powerless to conquer Germany. German 
valour, German organization, German science 
have emerged with honour from this ordeal, 
the most terrible that a nation has ever under- 
gone. Germany is greater and mightier than 
ever before." 

It behoves us to learn from our enemies, 
and, abstraction made from the monstrosities 
which are indelibly associated with the German 
name, there is much which the Teutons can 
still teach us. That the secret of success lies 



230 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

in a comprehensive system of organization is 
self-evident. But that organization must 
utilize all the resources of the Allies and include 
permanent arrangements, economic and other, 
for a future which shall not be a continuation 
of the past. Many of the advantages which 
the old ordering of things assured us are gone 
beyond recall. Conscription is become in- 
evitable. Free trade is an institution of the 
past. The control of armies in the field by 
delegates of a democratic parliament such as 
is now demanded by the French Chamber is a 
dangerous craving for the fleshpots of Egypt. 
Whether Germany wins or loses, her rebellion 
against European civilization will effect sub- 
stantial and durable changes in the methods 
of that civilization from which even the 
United States will not be exempted. 

Thus between the old order of things and 
the new yawns an abyss which has to be 
crossed before we can worst our enemies even 
in the military campaign which is but one 
phase of the world-struggle. Our resources 
for the purpose of bridging it are ample, but 
our first difficulty is the circumstance that we 
are chained to the old system and are still 
unwilling to burst the bonds that hold us. 
And until efficacious means of effecting this 
are adopted the end must remain unattainable. 
Victory will not descend on our camp like a 
manna from on high. The Allied Armies do 
not resemble the mulberry tree which, having 
long lagged behind its rivals, suddenly bursts 
into fruit as well as flower. 

During the past twenty months the Allies in 
general, and the British in particular, have 
achieved feats of which they have reason to 
be proud — feats which two years ago seemed 



GERMANY'S RESOURCEFULNESS 231 

beyond the compass of human effort. But, 
much as we have done, we have not reached, 
nor indeed attempted to reach, the limits of 
our capacities, and the story of these memorable 
twenty months of struggle is dimmed by the 
shadow of the vaster exploits from which we 
have unaccountably shrunk. 

The old-world social conceptions still preva- 
lent in Great Britain afford no standard by 
which to gauge the significance of the crisis 
through which Europe is passing, nor do they 
provide efficacious means of satisfying the 
pressing needs which it has created. Yet 
the nation's guides perceive nothing to change 
in those conceptions; on the contrary, they 
uphold them zealously. No event has occurred 
in modern times of greater concern to Europe 
than the unleashing of disruptive forces which 
threaten when the war is over to break up the 
politico-social fabric. Now, the mere prospect 
of this tremendous upheaval and of its sequel 
is, one would fancy, calculated to arouse the 
spirited interest of all the nations affected. 
Yet in Great Britain, whose very existence it 
menaces, it was at first received with such 
unmeaning comments as " business as usual." 
The alertness of the people's sensations — 
always inconsiderable — for volcanic outbursts 
which have their centre abroad, has never 
been quite so blunted as to-day. 

Germany cultivates force not for its own 
sake but because it happens to suit her par- 
ticular purpose. For this reason she preaches 
the doctrines that right and might are identical, 
that the end hallows the means, that military 
and political necessity overrule treaties and 
laws. For as violence and cunning may still 
gain triumphs, under the conditions that once 



232 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

rendered them the only weapons of man, 
Germany's first step is to bring about such 
conditions and to spread faith in the teachings 
of the new gospel. What the success of these 
efforts would involve is evident. All the 
ground slowly and painfully reclaimed from 
the primitive state of nature, transmuted into 
social order, and moralized by the altruistic 
accord of progressive humanity, would be 
submerged by the tidal wave of Teutonism. 

The first clash of the two forces which took 
place a generation ago was hardly noticed. 
Germany stretched out her feelers tenderly, 
and even when she was draining nation after 
nation of its life juices, she took care to lull 
the patient while sucking his blood. Accord- 
ingly her attack provoked no counter-attack, 
nay, there was no serious attempt at defence. 
Those who directed the forces of the civilized 
communities were unconscious of the counter- 
force that was steadily undermining these — 
so unconscious that in lieu of isolating and 
paralysing it, the tendency of their endeavours 
was to further and to strengthen it. For they 
hastily assumed that it, too, was a great moral 
force in an uncouth guise and should also be 
tended and cultivated. Their duty, had they 
hearkened to its promptings, would have been 
to employ towards the criminal plotters against 
Europe's civilized communities coercion of the 
same drastic description that once enabled 
mankind to substitute for the barbarous usages 
of savage tribes the habits of social relation- 
ship and moral self-surrender to the weal of 
all. Among the mainstays of Germany's type 
of society and the instruments by which it 
was built up are heavy artillery, mighty armies, 
the gallows, bribery and guile. With some of 



GERMANY'S RESOURCEFULNESS 233 

those arms she had opened the campaign of 
conquest a quarter of a century ago, and of 
that campaign the present war, unexampled 
though it be, is but an acute and transient 
episode. This would appear to be the only- 
true reading of contemporary events. 

Few careful students of European politics 
will now deny that the struggle between the 
forces for which Teutonism stands and those 
on which the social ordering of the rest of 
Europe is based was inaugurated long ago, 
that the ground was then cleared for the new 
politico-social structure, or that the dissolution 
of our " effete, drowsy States, saturated with 
wealth and honeycombed with hypocrisies," 
was carefully planned and taken in hand with 
scientific precision. It is equally clear, to 
those who have eyes to see, that the present 
clash of nations, despite its appalling effects 
on civilization, is but an acuter phase of that 
campaign, a series of incidents in a mighty 
struggle which neither began in July 1914 nor 
will end with the close of hostilities, but will 
rage on for years to come in less sanguinary 
but more decisive forms. For the future peace 
— whatever its terms— which will silence the 
cannon's boom, will but transfer the war 
theatre without ending the war. The methods 
will be changed from military to economic. 
But only the weapons will be different; the 
military discipline, the callous indifference to 
the dictates of human and divine law, the 
utter absence of scruple will continue to char- 
acterize the tactics of our enemy, who will 
then have a wider scope for his activities than 
the battle-field can offer. The German has no 
match among the allied nations in the regions 
of the new diplomacy, trade, industry, applied 



234 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

science, insidious journalism and vast organiza- 
tion. He is incomparably better equipped 
than they, and owing to his amorality has 
none of those obstacles to contend with which 
so often confront them with scruples and check 
their advance. 

And during the progress of the present war 
the Teutons are making ready for that econo- 
mico-political duel which will, they hope, give 
them the decisive superiority for which they 
had vainly hoped from the war. That hope, if 
their experience of the past thirty years be a 
fair indication, is by no means groundless. 

Not to realize these facts to-day is to play 
into the hands of our enemies, as we have been 
steadfastly doing during the past thirty years. 
The British and their allies are being over- 
come less by German skill and cleverness than 
by their own sluggishness, narrowness of out- 
look and love of ease. As the German pro- 
fessor, whose utterances I have already quoted, 
tersely put it : " My confidence is founded 
above all else on our enemies' incapacity for 
organization." In truth, it is not inborn in- 
capacity to which we owe our unquestioned 
inferiority, but to the atrophy of will-power 
which is one of the consequences of years of 
egotism, overweening confidence, self-indul- 
gence and the loss of an inspiring social faith. 

Now, there is every reason to assume that 
these master facts are not yet recognized by 
our rulers, who seem perfectly contented that 
the nation should go on living as before from 
hand to mouth, with no far-reaching views for 
the future. This insular narrow-mindedness 
is natural. For the Ministers in power are 
the same who obstinately refused to credit the 
evidence of their senses, which went to prove 



GERMANY'S RESOURCEFULNESS 235 

that Germany was bending all her energies 
to the successful prosecution of a formidable 
campaign against us and our presumptive 
allies for a whole generation. The frank recog- 
nition of this state of masked hostility would 
have imposed on the Government the cor- 
relate duty of taking up the challenge, readjust- 
ing our public life to the altered conditions, 
urging the nation to make heavy sacrifices and 
dissatisfying radical constituencies, whose one 
ideal is to devote themselves exclusively to 
parochial policy and domestic legislation. And 
the chiefs of the party in power lacked the 
mental and moral strength to throw off their 
deep-rooted apprehension of the consequences 
to party prospects, of increased taxation and 
other burdens of citizenship. They never 
grasped the situation as a whole, but restricted 
their survey to each fragmentary question as 
it was thrust into the foreground of actualities 
and eliminated every other. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

THE PERILS OF PARTY POLITICS 

No bold, broad, stable policy, therefore, was 
ever conceived by those party politicians. 
The vast organization which was destined 
to destroy the old order of things in Europe, 
and whose manifestations were an open book 
to all observers who brought acuteness and 
patience to the study, was not merely ignored 
by them — its very existence was denied, and 
those who refused to join the ranks of the 
deniers were brand-marked as mischief-makers. 
The nation's responsible trustees, by way of 
justifying this singular attitude, accepted im- 
plicitly our enemy's account of his unfriendly 
acts and enterprises. Thus it was the chief 
of His Majesty's Government who, from his 
place in the House of Commons, emphatically 
asserted that it behoved the British nation to 
welcome the Baghdad railway enterprise as 
a precious cultural undertaking devoid of 
political objects and, therefore, well worthy 
of our support. In vain the writer of these 
lines laid bare the real designs of the German 
Government, and adduced cogent proofs that 
the seemingly cultural scheme was but an 
integral part of a vast campaign, of which 
one object was the ousting of Britons from 
the Near and Middle East and the substitu- 
tion of German overlordship there. They 
shut their eyes and stopped their ears, and 

236 



PERILS OF PARTY POLITICS 237 

bade us rejoice that Britain is not as other 
countries and can afford to welcome and even 
further Germany's " cultural " projects. 

It was our party politicians who, when the 
ground-swell of international anger and the 
premonitory rumble of volcanic forces became 
audible, diverted public attention from the 
symptoms and solemnly assured their country- 
men that Germany had no intention of going 
to war. To the author of these pages, who 
was at the pains of unfolding in private his 
information and conclusions on this subject 
to one of those leaders, the answer given ran 
thus : " Your intentions are patriotic and 
your accuracy of observation is probably 
scientific. But your conclusions are wholly 
erroneous. You must admit that you are a 
pessimist. Nor can you deny that we members 
of the Cabinet dispose of fuller and more de- 
cisive data for a judgment than you, with all 
your opportunities, can muster. After all, 
we do know something of the temper of the 
German Government. And we have cogent 
grounds for holding that neither the Kaiser 
nor his Ministers want war. Bethmann Holl- 
weg is the most pacific chancellor Germany has 
ever had. And the German people, bellicose 
though you think them, are to the full as 
peace-loving as our own. Their one desire 
is to be allowed to vie with us in commercial 
and industrial pursuits. So true is this, that 
if we suppose the improbable, that the Kaiser's 
Government should feel disposed to bring about 
a European war, that design would be thwarted 
by the Reichstag backed by the bulk of the 
population." 

Thus the men who presided over the destinies 
of the British Empire either had no eye for 



238 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

the triumphant progress of the German cam- 
paign that had been going forward for years 
unchecked, or, if they discerned any of its 
episodes, saw them only through the softening 
and distorting medium of deceptive assurances 
and explanations emanating from Berlin. And 
on the strength of these illusive phrases they 
kept the country in a state of unpreparedness 
for the military form of the struggle for which 
our enemy was making ready, and if they had 
had their way our navy — which was our anchor 
of salvation — would also perhaps have been 
shorn of its strength. 

When at last the war broke out, it was our 
party politicians, the men to whom we still 
look up for light and guidance, who misin- 
terpreted its nature and underestimated the 
urgent needs of the Empire. It was they 
who conceived the campaign as though it 
were one of our occasional colonial expeditions, 
and would fain base the strength of our land 
army abroad on the small number of troops 
which the Government had conditionally under- 
taken to provide. And throughout the first 
sixteen months of the war, it was they who 
went on doling out contingents with Troy 
weights and measures like Mrs. Partington 
beating back the tidal waves with a mop. 
It was they, too, who were at extraordinary 
pains and risked their prestige, to throw away 
the splendid privileged position which, at the 
outset of the struggle, we chanced to occupy in 
South-Eastern Europe. Every blunder into 
which petty municipal minds could fall when 
confronted with a wild revolutionary welter, 
marked the hesitant policy of the British 
Government. This aimless chaos of soul was 
the main cause of the woeful waste of our 



PERILS OF PARTY POLITICS 239 

political advantages and enormous resources 
in the accomplishment of secondary ends 
which generally led nowhere. It was thus 
that they forfeited the active support of 
Turkey, Bulgaria and Greece, foolishly stood 
by applauding every step those nations took 
towards the camp of our enemies, and then felt 
constrained to turn to their own people whom 
they had unwittingly misled and call upon it 
for the sacrifice of the flower of its manhood. 

It was they who sacrificed, through sheer ad- 
ministrative incapacity, the decided superiority 
over the Teutons which we enjoyed in the air 
at the outset of the war. It is now admitted 
that our mastery in that region was then com- 
plete. All that the country demanded of 
them was that they should hold it. But what 
with divided control, restricted views, and the 
policy of insufficient means — petits paquets — 
as the French term it, they allowed our enemies 
to outstrip us. And to-day in the air as on 
land it is the Germans who have the initiative 
and the Allies who are condemned to the 
defensive. Yet experts had pointed out over 
and over again what should be done and what 
avoided. Their advice was obviously sound 
and their criticism obviously irrefutable. But 
the men in power fumbled and floundered on 
until we had forfeited our mastery in the air 
to our enemies. And ever since then the nation 
has been paying the penalty. Yet it is to the 
men responsible for these costly blunders that 
the nation still looks for salvation ! 

It was the same men who conceived or 
sanctioned the plan of an expedition to Meso- 
potamia. Whether this was a wise or a foolish 
project, when once decided upon it should 
have been carried out with might and main. 



240 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

All the means requisite to success should have 
been taken; all the resources possessed by the 
Empire should have been drawn upon and 
nothing needlessly left to chance. Above all 
things else, the views of the man charged with 
the execution of the plan should have been 
elicited and carefully weighed. As a matter 
of fact, General Townshend's judgment was 
decidedly adverse to the expedition under the 
conditions in which it was planned. For the 
forces assigned to him, amounting to far less 
than a division, were absurdly inadequate, and 
their inadequacy was easily demonstrable. He 
ought to have had at least two divisions more. 
But once again the game of divided control 
and diluted responsibility was played, with con- 
sequences which would in any other country 
suffice to wreck the Government chargeable 
with the blunder. 

Yet it is to the men who committed that 
and all the other blunders that the nation still 
looks confidently for salvation ! 

If the British people finally obtain it under 
those leaders they may fairly claim to have 
abrogated the law of cause and effect. 

These same men are still the mentors and 
the spokesmen of a free nation which can 
choose its leaders. It is they to whom the 
people has entrusted the conduct of the most 
critical phase of the whole campaign in which 
the recurrence of similar errors may foredoom 
the Empire to disruption. And it is, humanly 
speaking, inconceivable that miscalculations 
of that kind should be eliminated, in view of 
the crucial fact that the Ministers at present 
in power, if we may judge by their utterances 
and their acts, entertain a fundamentally false 
conception of the relations between the Teutons 



PERILS OF PARTY POLITICS 241 

and the allied nations. Among the elements 
of that conception there would seem to be no 
room for the historic past. The present stands 
by itself with a history that goes no further 
back than the month of July 1914, and will 
convulsively come to an end with the truce 
that ushers in the future treaty of peace. For 
that diplomatic instrument will put an end 
to the struggle and inaugurate an era of inter- 
national tranquillity. Such is the theory on 
which their entire policy is based. 

We must fight on now to a finish, but the 
upshot is sure to be a finish. Their anticipa- 
tions of an unclouded dawn, when the present 
night has worn itself into the streaky greyness 
of morning, are certain to come to pass. The 
ordeal which we are undergoing is tremendous, 
but at any rate the nation and its allies will 
emerge from it rejuvenated under the spell of 
the present magicians, as the old ram emerged 
lamb-like and frisky from Medea's cauldron. 
That, in brief, would seem to be the picture in 
the mind's eye of the British Government, and 
to that conception all their plans are being 
accommodated. 

As a matter of ascertainable fact, neither we 
nor our Allies have anything of the kind to 
hope for. In the near future the present 
campaign will have come to a close, but not 
the struggle between ourselves and our Teuton 
aggressors. For this war, far from ending the 
tragic duel between the two types of com- 
munity life in Europe, is but one of its transient 
episodes. The trial of strength began many 
years ago and will not be decided for many 
years to come, how satisfactory so ever the 
terms of the future peace may be to ourselves 
and our Allies. This is a fundamental truth 



242 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

which has not yet penetrated the conscious- 
ness of either rulers or people. And for that 
reason the problem awaiting them is mis- 
stated, belittled. According to the received 
version it is to beat back German aggression 
and render it impossible in the future. Now, 
however successfully the first part of the task 
may be discharged — and it is still very uphill 
work — the second is a sheer impossibility, and to 
lay our plans as though it were feasible and 
soon to be realized, is to embark on the body 
of a sleeping whale in the belief that it is an 
island in the sea. And to negotiate peace 
abroad and give an impulse to politics at 
home, with that comforting prospect in mind, 
is to lead the nation into a Serbonian bog 
whence no escape is possible. The leaders of 
Great Britain are so permeated with the 
duties, the rights, the hopes and the strivings 
of parliamentary parties, that they involun- 
tarily think in terms of home politics and have 
no chord in their being responsive to the 
emotions that sway the German soul and nerve 
the German arm. 

To the average mind it is clear that the 
terms on which peace might be negotiated, 
if the end of the war were also to be the end 
of the struggle, might differ considerably from 
those on which a statesman would properly 
insist, were he convinced that the sheathing 
of the sword marked but the opening of a new 
phase of the duel. And it is this alternative 
which it behoves us to lay at the foundation 
of our peace treaty, if it should rest with the 
Allies to impose their terms. The problem, 
therefore, which a Government that governs 
has to tackle, is twofold : the conclusion of 
such a peace as will confer on the Entente 



PERILS OF PARTY POLITICS 243 

States, individually and collectively, all possible 
advantages, not for contemplating such a 
tranquil state of things as the ministerial con- 
ception postulates, but for the prosecution of 
the struggle with the greatest chances of 
success, and for the reconstruction of the 
social fabric at home with a view to harmon- 
izing it with the new requirements, and, in 
particular, with the needs created by the 
constant state of economic, financial, diplo- 
matic and journalistic warfare in which we 
shall be engaged. The social ordering of 
Great Britain must be not merely modified 
but remodelled and rebuilt from the ground- 
work to the coping-stone. One of the first 
needs of the nation is the education, physical 
and spiritual, of the new generation. Patriotic 
sentiment must be engrafted on the receptive 
soul of the child, and its range of sympathy 
widened and deepened. The duty of self-abne- 
gation for the welfare of the community must 
be inculcated, together with new conceptions 
of personal dignity and worth. To the domestic 
sentiment in those cramped and distorted forms 
in which it still survives in Britain, where we 
cling tenaciously to so many institutions de- 
void of life and utility, a less commanding 
part must be assigned in the future than 
heretofore. Above all, it behoves us to en- 
courage the scientific spirit with its correlates, 
patient thought and study, as opposed to the 
arrogant amateurism which, without rudi- 
mentary qualifications, claims to have a voice 
in the solution of every problem under the 
sun. It is largely to this dilettante tempera- 
ment of the nation and its rulers that we owe 
the disasters we have sustained and the dangers 
with which we are threatened. 



244 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Looking back, then, dispassionately upon the 
movement, deliberately organized over thirty 
years ago by the restless German mind and 
pushed steadily forward ever since over diplo- 
matic barriers, financial hindrances, economic 
obstacles and international laws, one is struck 
less by the unparalleled magnitude of the 
enterprise than by the blindness and sluggish- 
ness of its destined victims. And it is largely 
in these and kindred negative qualities that 
we have to seek for the clue to the astonish- 
ing sequence of successes scored by our 
enemies in their military and naval, as well 
as their politico-economic, campaigns. More- 
over, these same defects, deep-rooted and 
widespread among the allied peoples, consti- 
tute their main source of weakness during the 
economic and decisive tug-of-war which will 
be ushered in by the treaty of peace. For the 
temperament, traditions and strivings of each 
of these nations are so many obstacles to the 
gathering of their scattered moral energies 
and wasted spiritual forces in one fertilizing 
stream. They are bent on joining incom- 
patible elements in a political synthesis. In 
the name of national independence and by 
way of a telling protest against the vassalage 
which binds Austria to Germany, the Entente 
nations spurn the notion of any common 
accord which requires the practice of self- 
surrender as a base, and are resolved under the 
strain of circumstance to present such a loosely- 
joined front to the enemy as will not involve 
their foregoing one iota of their freedom or one 
tittle of their national claims. How, in these 
conditions, they expect ever to rise to that 
height of moral fervour without which the 
quasi-ascetic effort demanded of them is 



PERILS OF PARTY POLITICS 245 

inconceivable, has not yet been explained. 
As usual, they count upon effects without 
causes, upon an ingathering of the harvest 
with no preceding seedtime. Now, inter- 
dependence and compromise are the indis- 
pensable conditions of that cohesion which 
alone can engender the force required. A 
condition approaching organic coherency must 
be attained before a smooth working system 
can be created among the Allies. But as each 
of them is still rooted to the past, permeated 
by its own interests and aspirations, and jealous 
not only of the substance of its liberty but 
also of the shadow, the distance yet to be 
traversed before the goal can be reached is 
enormous, and the road rugged and beset with 
pitfalls. 

A glance at the past and present may 
enable us to gauge aright the nature of some 
of the difficulties that have to be surmounted 
in the future. 



CHAPTER XIX 

PAST AND PRESENT 

Let us begin with the present, in view of the 
circumstance that the war has brought the 
allied peoples into a much nearer approach 
to union and has more fully systematized their 
efforts than can ever be the case in peace time. 
We find, then, two groups of belligerents pitted 
against each other, whose resources in men, 
money and economic supplies are strikingly 
unequal. The Teutons are by far the weaker 
side, and even in spite of their long prepara- 
tions ought to have been thoroughly beaten 
long ago. So evident and encouraging was the 
comparison that the Entente nations them- 
selves boldly grounded their calculations on it, 
and anticipated a brief spell of warfare and a 
decisive victory. And this forecast seemed 
reasonable enough when the material elements 
were weighed and contrasted. The Entente 
communities occupy 68,031,000 square kilo- 
metres of territory, which are inhabited by a 
population of 770,060,000, or say 46 per cent, 
of the entire land on the globe and 47 per cent, 
of the entire human race. The Central Empires, 
on the other hand, possess no more than 
5,921,000 square kilometres with 150,199,000 
inhabitants, which amounts to only 4 per 
cent, of dry land on the globe and 9 # 1 per 
cent, of mankind. Add to that the circum- 
stance that in the air our superiority over our 

246 



PAST AND PRESENT 247 

enemies was undisputed, and that the odds in 
favour of our enlisting the active support of 
the Balkan States were overwhelming. The 
chances in favour of the Allies, therefore, were 
and are enormous. That being so, why, it 
may well be asked, has the course of the 
military, naval and air campaign so uniformly 
favoured the weaker side ? It is no answer 
to point out that Germany and Austria had 
been organizing the war for over thirty years, 
or had contrived to mobilize all their re- 
sources when the first shot was fired. That 
explanation would account for their pro- 
gress during the first few months, but not 
for the victories they scored down to the 
beginning of April 1916. It was loudly pro- 
claimed by British journalists that the Berlin 
General Staff had based its plan on the assump- 
tion that the struggle would be decided in a 
few months and certainly by the end of 1914. 
And the inference was drawn that as this time- 
table was upset, Germany was so bewildered 
that she could hardly draw up another plan 
and adjust her forces to that. She had shot 
her bolt, we were assured, had missed the 
target, and it was beyond her power to put 
forth another effort. But events refuted these 
false prophets, without, however, greatly im- 
pairing their credit with the multitude. They 
still continue to describe Germany's dire straits 
and foretell her speedy collapse. And they 
are listened to with eagerness and trust. 

In truth the root of the matter lies deeper. 
One of the most telling factors, in every armed 
conflict between peoples, consists of the sum 
total of imponderabilia which elude analysis. 
Intellectual and moral equipment, as I ventured 
to write when the war began, sometimes counts 



248 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

for more than battalions. And I instanced the 
Russo-Japanese campaign as a case in point. 
One belligerent may regard the campaign as a 
temporary calamity to be endured until it 
can be conveniently got rid of, while another 
may gird his loins and go forth to battle exul- 
tant like the fanaticized warriors of Cromwell. 
The former will contemplate the struggle and 
regulate the conduct of it in the light of 
immediate expediency, while the latter will 
treat the war as a life-task and boldly throw 
the weight of everything he has, and is, and 
hopes for into the blows he deals his adver- 
sary. Now in this struggle the Teuton is the 
fanaticized warrior. He is fighting for an ideal, 
which, whether or no he understands it, he 
caresses and deems his very own. The hopes 
and dreams of the leaders of the nation have 
been communicated to the individual citizen, 
who, having lived for them, is ready to die 
for them. Our people, on the other hand, 
have never enjoyed that education in patriotism 
which is bestowed on every Teuton, and they 
are wanting in the strength of imagination, 
the spirit of cohesion and the energizing social 
faith which might have made up for the 
deficiency. 

Then, again, over against the Allies' in- 
exhaustible resources we must put the marvel- 
lous capacity for organization which intensifies 
those of our enemy. The nearest known 
approach to it is found in the Japanese, who, 
there is little doubt, if pressed by circumstance, 
would match the Teuton in resourcefulness and 
even outdo him in the spirit of self-sacrifice. 
To this precious asset in Germany's leaders 
corresponds a superlative degree of docility 
and self-surrender in her people which offer 



PAST AND PRESENT 249 

a striking contrast to the strongly marked 
individualist tendencies of the British, French 
and Russian races. Nay, one may go farther 
and assert that the central streams of national 
life in each of these countries flows in channels 
of party politics, which no influential leader 
has ever attempted to deepen or widen. The 
German, on the contrary, as we saw, associates 
his every work and undertaking with ideas of 
almost cosmic breadth and is actuated by 
interests to which all the larger problems of 
humanity are akin. And he took timely pos- 
session of every lever that might contribute 
to the success of his revolt against European- 
ism, when his far-reaching scheme was yet in 
the early phases of execution. 

Everything that human foresight could think 
of was carefully studied, everything that human 
ingenuity could provide for was thoroughly 
effected and systematized. Royal dynasties 
were founded abroad by German princes. 
German colonies settled in Russia, Poland, 
Palestine and Brazil. German schools were 
opened in Roumania, Spain, Asia Minor, the 
Ottoman Empire, the Tsardom. Foreign news- 
papers were bought or subsidized. Protestant 
sects with pro-German tendencies were en- 
couraged. Banks were founded with Entente 
capital and employed to ruin the trade of 
the nations that subscribed it. Colonies of 
mechanics, clerks, middlemen were settled in 
every European country and colony and ob- 
tained control of the nation's industries and 
trade. Special legislation was enacted in Berlin 
to enable the German to become a foreign 
subject in externals while bound by all the 
duties of a citizen of his own country. 

As the hour for the military and naval 



250 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

struggle was drawing near intestine strife 
was industriously stirred up in all those 
countries whose rivalry the Germans had 
reason to apprehend. Emissaries were de- 
spatched to Egypt who made common cause 
with the disaffected and restless elements of 
the population, cultivated friendship with the 
Senussi and smuggled in arms to would-be 
African rebels. In India German " scientific 
explorers " hobnobbed with the natives, criti- 
cized the state of " serfage " to which British 
rule had reduced one of the most highly 
civilized races of mankind, and made overtures 
to the Afghans. To Abyssinia another " scien- 
tific expedition " was despatched, which con- 
sisted of a number of German officers and 
one explorer. After a circuitous and difficult 
journey it arrived at Massaua in March 1915, 
and requested the authorization of the Italian 
Governor of Erithea, the Marquess Salvago- 
Raggi, to push on to Adis Abeba, in order to 
re-establish communications between the Ger- 
man Legation there and the Berlin Foreign 
Office. The real object of the expedition, as 
the Italian Government well knew, was to 
incite the young Negus to attack the British 
in the Sudan and the French in Djibuti. But 
Italy, although still neutral, understood too 
well how difficult it would have been for her 
to limit Abyssinia's war-like operations to the 
French and British possessions and ward them 
off from her own colonies. Baron Sonnino 
accordingly declined to accord the permission 
asked for, and consented only to allow a large 
consignment of " correspondence " to be sent 
on. 1 

1 Cf. Idea Nazionale, March 7, 1915; Tribuna, April 1, 
1915. 



PAST AND PRESENT 251 

Later on Turkish officers were sent to Libya 
to egg on the Arabs to harass the Italians 
there. The Kaiser himself despatched a letter 
in Arabic to the Senussi which was inter- 
cepted on a Greek sailing vessel near Tripoli. 
It is said to have been enclosed in an embossed 
casket, and was found on board together with 
£4000 in gold and a number of oriental gifts. 
The letter, if genuine, is worth recording. 
Wilhelm II, the Supreme Head of the Protest- 
ant Church in Germany, gives himself therein, 
among other high sounding titles, those of 
Allah's Envoy and Islam's Protector, and 
states explicitly that it is his will that the 
Senussi 's doughty warriors should drive the 
" infidels " from the land which is the heritage 
of the true believers and their chief. This, 
from the " supreme Bishop " of one of the 
Christian Churches, is characteristic. 

In Asia Minor Germany's machinations were 
carried on with a much greater measure of 
success. Her former opponents had with- 
drawn their opposition and undertaken to 
lend her positive assistance to attain ends 
which were directed against themselves. This 
chapter of Entente diplomacy is marked by 
broad streaks of farcical comedy calculated 
to bewilder the serious student. France was 
converted to political orthodoxy on the sub- 
ject of the Baghdad Railway and its cultural 
significance. Some of her publicists frankly 
repented that she had so long looked upon it 
with disfavour, and threw the blame on Russia, 
for whose sake they had kept aloof. At 
Potsdam the Tsar's Minister abandoned his 
objections to the Baghdad enterprise and 
undertook to build a railway line from Persia, 
which would allow another stretch of country 



252 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

to be tapped by the German Railway Company. 
Great Britain, acknowledging the error of her 
ways, agreed that Koweit should not be the 
terminus and made valuable concessions to the 
Teuton, the realization of which was hindered 
by the outbreak of the war. Turkey, through 
Enver, who had imported from the Fatherland 
a band of military " instructors " under Liman 
von Sanders, became the ame damnee of 
Germany. In Persia every warlike and pre- 
datory tribe was courted by the Teuton in- 
truder, and the German mission at Teheran, 
as well as the Consulates in the chief towns 
of the Shahdom, became centres of agitation 
against Britain and Russia and branches of 
the German General Staff. 

In the Tsar's dominions German agents 
organized a series of strikes in the various 
works belonging to their countrymen, paid 
the strikers and fostered a subversive political 
movement which bade fair to culminate in 
a real revolution. In Belgium the Flemings, 
who had for years been protesting against the 
refusal of their Government to give them a 
Flemish University in Ghent, were incited against 
the Walloons, whose dialect is of French origin 
and whose sympathizers were the entire French 
people. And one of the joint acts of the 
German administration in Brussels has been 
to appoint a commission to submit a scheme 
for the creation of a Flemish high school in 
Ghent and accentuate the differences between 
the two elements of the population. 1 

Meanwhile, in Germany the work of organiza- 

1 A spirited protest against this poisonous endeavour 
was published by a number of Belgians, including Camille 
Huysmans, who refused to accept any favours from the 
Germans. 



PAST AND PRESENT 253 

tion went steadily forward. While British 
Ministers were on the look-out for reasons or 
pretexts for diminishing expenditure on ship- 
building, Germany, under von Tirpitz, was 
stealing a march on us and increasing hers. 
And over and above this, she was arranging a 
surprise in the shape of submarines and air- 
craft which, had the war been deferred for 
another couple of years, might have not only 
removed the odds in our favour but given 
her a decided superiority over us. And, by 
way of intensifying the value of her fleet, she 
set to work to deepen the Kiel Canal and thus 
to confer a sort of ubiquity on her battleships, 
which can now concentrate in the North Sea 
or the Baltic without let or hindrance from 
the enemy. When the epoch of the Dread- 
noughts was opened German armoured ships 
had a displacement of no more than 13,000 
tons. The larger type of battleship, which 
was afterwards constructed, could not pass 
through the Canal, which had to be deepened. 
The necessary work was so thoughtfully and 
opportunely taken in hand that it was ter- 
minated in July 1914, just when the harvest 
for that year was also ingathered. Asphyxi- 
ating gas had been manufactured in the year 
1911, as the Russians have discovered on 
certain of the machines. Thus when the fatal 
hour struck, everything was ready. 

In the financial sphere, too, we find the same 
comprehensive survey, the same eye for detail, 
the same forethought and combination. When 
hostilities broke out British banks held about 
£1,100,000,000 of their depositors' money. A 
large percentage of this had been employed to 
discount foreign, and in especial German bills, 
so that the paper remained in Great Britain 



254 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

and the gold was transferred to Germany, 
where it plays its part against us. But those 
marvellous efforts put forth with such effect 
by our enemies made no appeal to our rulers. 
Nowhere in the British Empire was there any 
man of mark thinking and acting for the 
community. The political pilots who had 
charge of the state-ship possessed neither chart 
nor compass nor rudder. Neither did they 
feel the need of these things. The Govern- 
ment disbelieved in war and was minded, if a 
struggle should be precipitated, to keep out 
of it. Nobody envisaged the needs and in- 
terests of the Empire as aspects of a single 
problem. Nobody had any clear-cut plan for 
the working out of the destinies of the British 
people. The interests of party, the expediency 
of local reforms, the squabbles between this 
faction and that, constituted the burning 
topics of the hour, and there were none other. 
And it was while we were thus wrangling with 
and threatening each other that the blast of 
the clarion ushered in the day of doom. 

The secrets of nature, revealed by science to 
a nation which acknowledges no restraints, 
then became weapons of wholesale destruction 
to be used to subjugate all civilization. Now, 
there are some reasons for assuming that 
civilization will escape the thraldom, but there 
are unhappily equally cogent grounds for 
apprehending that some of its most precious 
achievements will be irrecoverably lost and 
others greatly impaired. Had there been a 
master mind at the helm of the British state- 
ship before the war or at its opening, we might 
have been spared the necessity of signing one 
day a temporary peace amid the ruins of 
European culture. 



PAST AND PRESENT 255 

But no puissant genius in any of the allied 
countries towered above the dead level of medio- 
crity. Great Frenchmen, Britons and Russians 
were said to be available, but there was no 
great man in evidence. And this want proved 
disastrous. In Germany, on the other hand, it 
was hardly felt. For it was compensated by the 
existence of a vast human machine, adaptable 
to every change of circumstance, capable of 
assuming countless Protean forms simultane- 
ously, ready with a solution for the most 
unexpected problems, provided with organs 
suited to the discharge of every conceivable 
function, all directed to the same end. It was 
the same organism that had worked with such 
brilliant success for over thirty years, growing 
and perfecting itself steadily until it became 
the concrete manifestation of a whole system 
of thought, sentiment and co-ordinated action. 
Germany had developed into a powerful national 
State in which the spirit of self- surrender for 
the good of the community animates all sec- 
tions alike, all of which co-operate effectively, 
through the organizations which they spon- 
taneously created, for the realization of their 
common objects. And therein lay her force. 

On the outbreak of war Germany was faced 
with a group of the most arduous and intricate 
problems any Government has ever yet had to 
tackle. For most of them she had had the 
time and the forethought to prepare. But 
others arose which had been neither provided 
for nor foreseen, in consequence of her mis- 
taken assumption that Great Britain would 
hold aloof from the war. The total value of 
her exports and imports in the year 1913 was 
computed at 1,000,000,000 sterling, and an 
infinity of fine threads bound her industrial 



256 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

activity with foreign countries. By Great 
Britain's declaration of war, for which Germany 
was unprepared until the last days of July, 
nearly all these threads were snapped asunder, 
and the industrial and economic life of the 
Empire had to be swiftly readjusted to the 
new conditions. And here it was that the 
nation rose as one man to the unparalleled 
occasion, faced the tremendous ordeal, and, 
contrary to the expectations of its adver- 
saries — ever prone to judge others by them- 
selves — has continued not merely to exist, but 
to extend its conquests ever since. 

It was in the financial sphere that the first 
strain was felt. But perilous though it actu- 
ally was, it would have been intolerable but 
for the precautionary measures adopted in 
July and the ingenious devices applied by the 
Reichsbank immediately after. The first step 
taken was to substitute short -terms credit for 
long. The gold in the Reichsbank increased 
steadily, and from 1,009,000,000 marks on 
July 7, 1913, it rose to 1,356,000,000 by 
July 7, 1914. The war treasure hoarded in 
the Julius-Tower was doubled, so as to enable 
the Imperial Bank to issue 720,000,000 marks 
on the strength of it, whereby its gold 
cover was augmented from 1,253,000,000 to 
1,447,000,000. A further considerable reserve 
of silver was laid by, which proved extremely 
useful later on. One result of this policy was 
that on the fatal 31st July, no less than 
4,500,000,000 marks in banknotes could be 
issued without exceeding the limits prescribed 
by the law. 1 A network of Loan Banks was 
also created throughout the country in which 

1 One-third gold cover is the amount fixed. Cf. 
Professor J. Plenge, Der Krieg und die Volkswirtschaft. 



PAST AND PRESENT 257 

every one, possessed of property of any descrip- 
tion, could obtain credit to any amount, pro- 
vided the pledges warranted the advance. 

Nor were the large groups of business men 
neglected who had no pledges to offer yet sorely 
needed credit. For their behoof War Credit 
Banks were instituted, which transacted busi- 
ness on curious lines. A city or town sub- 
scribed a third or even more of the shares 
of the borrowing company, and the Imperial 
Bank conferred the right of rediscounting bills 
of exchange up to an amount equal to three 
times the value of the capital, and sometimes 
even more. Institutions were opened for ad- 
vancing money on house property, and for 
assisting special branches of industry. The 
Hansa-Bund, for instance, founded a War 
Credit Bank for " the Middle Classes " which, 
with the authorization of the Reichsbank, 
rediscounts bills of exchange drawn by indi- 
viduals for whom the Commune vouches. 
Associations were constituted in the country 
and in towns, and the nature of their work 
is evidenced by the 18,000 rural Savings and 
Credit Banks and 16,000 urban and trade 
associations. 1 For farmers and struggling land- 
owners, a Central Board, for the purchase of 
machines, was created, which also superintended 
the equitable distribution of orders among 
industrial firms. 

The suddenness of the declaration of war 
had for its effect, and perhaps also for one of 
its objects, the stemming of the flow of gold 
from the Reichsbank before it had exceeded 
the total of 100,000,000 marks and also 
the prevention of its disappearance from the 

1 These figures are drawn from statistics published in 
July 1914. Cf. Dr. Karl Hildebrand, Ein starkes Volk. 
s 



258 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

country. Soon afterwards gold was brought 
in astonishing quantities to the bank by all 
classes of citizens who had hoarded it jealously 
in peace-time, but now recognized the crimi- 
nality of applying the principles of individual 
ownership to what of right belongs to the 
jeopardized community. For the nation real- 
ized the fact that the condition of public 
danger entitled the Government to wield an 
unlimited degree of power over the lives and 
property of the people for the welfare of the 
community. 

If we compare this intelligent appreciation 
of the position by rulers and ruled, and their 
readiness to accommodate their respective 
actions to it and play their parts as organs for 
the discharge of special functions, with the 
haziness of conception, the misinterpretation 
of events, and the utter lack of co-operation 
displayed by the corresponding sections of the 
allied communities, we shall grasp the secret 
of the superiority of the seemingly weaker 
group of belligerents and the paltry results 
hitherto achieved by the stronger. 

German industry, too, the source of the 
nation's prosperity, was shaken to its founda- 
tions. It had worked largely for the foreign 
market. And all at once its exports were cut 
down by 60 per cent., because of the stoppage 
of the supplies of raw materials. Imports 
also fell by 75 per cent. One immediate 
consequence of this partial stagnation was 
the enormous increase of the army of the 
unemployed. Although 4,000,000 men were 
taken from the various industries and de- 
spatched against the Belgians, French and 
Russians, there were at the end of August 
no less than 3,400,000 men thrown out of 



PAST AND PRESENT 259 

employment. 1 Thus the total number of un- 
employed was 7,400,000, and as there were 
17,000,000 hands employed before the war, 
it may be inferred that German industry was 
reduced by 43 J per cent. It was in these 
conditions that the Teuton capacity for organ- 
ization was manifested. 

Two great industrial organizations flourished 
in Germany before the war, 2 and although 
occasionally disagreeing on various points, 
sensibly furthered the interests of their country- 
men at home and abroad. No sooner was war 
declared than they dropped their differences 
and constituted a War Committee for German 
Industry. Among the varied functions of this 
new body were the distribution of information 
respecting orders given by the State, new 
legislation, etc. ; co-operation with firms for the 
fulfilment of contracts despite the outbreak of 
hostilities; the selection of operatives, clerks, 
etc., for firms needing these; the obtainment 
of places for the unemployed and the organiza- 
tion of the credit system. 

This Committee also applied for and received 
permission to have all those skilled artisans 
recalled from the front whose services were 
deemed indispensable for war industries. It 
likewise watched over the distribution of State 
orders, and saw that each of the various firms 
received its due share. 

The organization of German industry during 
the war was taken in hand by a group of 
experts and officials possessed of the insight, 
knowledge and power necessary for the dis- 
charge of the arduous task. Among the 

1 Cf. Messenger of Europe, April 1915, M. Lurie. 

2 Der Zentral-Verband Deutscher Industrieller and Der 
Bund der Industriellen. 



260 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

members of the Board we find the names of 
representatives of finances, industries and the 
Government; the Minister of the Interior, all 
the members of the Federal Council, M.M. 
Gwinner, Bleichroder, Siemens, etc. Special 
bureaux were opened for various kinds of 
supplies, a Central Office for the War Supply 
of Tobacco, another for that of chocolate, a 
third for leather, a fourth for linen, etc. 1 
Another group of organizations dealing with 
the acquisition and distribution of raw stuffs 
possessed in certain cases the right of expro- 
priation, and is not allowed to make more 
than a certain limited profit on its transactions. 
Among them are an association for the supply 
of metals, another for chemicals, and a third 
for woollen stuffs. 

In consequence of the shortage of raw 
materials, economy and the employment of 
substitutes were everywhere resorted to spon- 
taneously before the Government had time to 
intervene. From every household came old 
copper vessels, copper wire, worn-out clothing 
from which the manufacturers removed the wool, 
leather straps, shoes, bags, etc. From Belgium 
and France everything that could be utilized as 
raw material was hurriedly transferred to the 
Fatherland. At first the supply of aluminium 
for castings and Zeppelins was insufficient, but 
a composition of spelter and tin was invented, 
which answered the main purposes equally 
well. Nickel being also scarce, coins of 10 
pfennige were withdrawn from circulation and 

1 It is affirmed by contrabandists in Scandinavia who 
are acting on Germany's behalf, that many of the com- 
missions for the acquisition of raw stuffs for Germany are 
composed almost exclusively of non-Russian subjects of 
the Tsar. 



PAST AND PRESENT 261 

utilized, while considerable quantities were 
imported from Scandinavian countries. The 
place of jute was taken by paper, and from 
paper under-garments were made. Roasted 
acorns, theretofore employed in lieu of coffee 
only by the poorer classes, thenceforward 
became the daily beverage of the middle classes 
as well. A substitute for olive oil was extracted 
from cherry stones, tainted meat was rendered 
harmless by chemical methods, nitrates were 
extracted from the air by a Norwegian process 
which the Germans had perfected and applied. 

Now, these achievements and the marvellous 
adaptability, energy and resourcefulness which 
they connote, are no mean elements in Ger- 
many's equipment for the coming economic 
struggle. They proclaim that the mind of the 
Teuton man of business is too firmly riveted 
on the goal to be fascinated by any special 
route leading towards it, and that it is suffi- 
ciently free and disengaged to turn with eager 
interest to any problem, however novel, with 
which it may be suddenly confronted. Use 
and want are not its masters, sluggish content- 
ment cannot numb its activity. The customers' 
requirements, nay, their whims and fancies, 
are ever sure to receive close attention and 
prompt satisfaction. The contrast between 
this unflagging alertness and the drowsy apathy 
of the British manufacturer and tradesman is 
an old story, which has evoked comments 
sharp enough, it would seem, to arouse the 
commercial community to a lively sense of 
its danger and duty. And yet there are, un- 
happily, cogent grounds for believing that the 
malady of listlessness is as malignant to-day 
as before the war. 

Now, these organizing and inventive talents 



262 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

of the Teuton, as compared with the subordi- 
nate aims, fitful energies and honest but mis- 
chievous conservatism of our own leaders and 
people, bear witness to the same twofold 
talent of the German for looking far ahead 
and contriving expedients on the spur of the 
moment. Great Britain's participation in the 
struggle cut off Germany from the sea and 
gave the two Central Empires the aspect of a 
beleaguered city. Hopes were entertained by 
the Allies that famine might reinforce the 
work of their armies and navies in compelling 
the enemy to sue for peace. About 9 per 
cent, of the corn used in Germany usually 
came from abroad, and now the interruption 
of the communications rendered this source of 
supply precarious. The soldiers, too, had to 
be fed on a scale of greater abundance than 
usual, and the prisoners of war, however poorly 
nourished, would consume a certain amount 
of corn. The first measure promulgated to 
meet the new conditions was a prohibition of 
exportation. Potato flour was employed in 
bread-baking. War bread was standardized 
for the whole Empire. The principal cities 
purchased vast quantities of cereals, and 
Prussia founded a War Corn Association for 
the acquisition of cereals to be stored until the 
ensuing spring. Expropriation was legalized. 
In these ways £40,000,000 worth of cereals 
were got together for consumption. The War 
Corn Association operated with a capital of 
£2,500,000, to which the States subscribed over 
one million, and the big cities one million, 
and the great industrial firms £450,000. 1 This 
corn was paid for at the highest market 
rates, the owners being compelled by law to 
1 Cf. Karl Hildebrand, Ein starkes Folk, p. 122. 



PAST AND PRESENT 263 

declare how much they possessed. With each 
of these proprietors — in the first phase with 
5,000,000 landowners — separate arrangements 
were concluded. The Association employed 
for the purpose nearly three thousand com- 
missioners and five hundred other officials, 
and the Credit Banks made advances on the 
quantities sold. 

Simultaneously with this home organization 
the other multifarious tasks of devising new 
weapons for the war, improving the various 
types of aircraft, building larger submarines 
and guns of greater calibre went forward with 
unimpaired speed. Nothing was too vast or 
too complicated to be undertaken, no detail 
was too trivial to be studied. Politics, 
economics, military strategy and national 
psychology were all cunningly interwoven in the 
various schemes laid for the destruction of the 
Allies. Russia was inveigled into continuing 
her trade with Germany, which, as we saw, was 
during the first year a nowise negligible quantity. 

A piquant detail in this connection is worthy 
of mention. 1 It is affirmed that the Customs 
House authorities on the Russo-Swedish 
frontiers discovered to their dismay that for 
well over a year Germany had been receiving 
from Russia a large proportion of the raw 
materials necessary for the fabrication of 
asphyxiating gas. It appears that Sweden, 
which in peace time was wont to import 
from the Tsardom a certain quantity of those 
products, trebled its demands during the first 
year of the war. 

Contingents of contrabandists were de- 
spatched to Greece, Spain, Morocco, Holland, 

1 It is noticed by the Italian and French press ; cf ., for 
instance, Roma, October 31, 1915. 



264 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Italy, Switzerland and the United States. 
Secret stations were established for supplying 
submarines with the wherewithal to carry on 
their war against inoffensive passenger steamers. 
Agents were kept in the neutral countries to 
corrupt the local press and poison the wells 
of information in order to allure the neutrals 
into belligerency. A highly organized news- 
distributing bureau was equipped in Berlin 
with all the requisites for falsifying facts 
and distorting military tidings. Its branches 
are spread over the globe. Passports were 
forged at first and later on genuine ones 
abstracted from the Berlin Foreign Office and 
handed over to spies. Strikes and outrages 
were engineered in the United States, Italy, 
and Russia. The Putiloff works, which before 
the war were nearly falling into German hands 
and have since been supplying munitions for 
the Tsar's army, were stricken with creeping 
paralysis, against which exhortations and 
threats were vain, and finally they had to be 
sequestrated by the State. Millions of dollars 
were expended in the United States in efforts 
to prevent the manufacture or the transport 
of munitions to the Allies. In Greece vast 
sums were cheerfully disbursed by Baron 
Schenk to work the elections and defeat 
Venizelos. Roumania was overrun by bands 
of Germans whose functions were to calum- 
niate, vilify, corrupt and threaten. Spain has 
been wrought upon in like manner by a small 
army of Teutons abundantly supplied with the 
same weapons. Persia was scoured by German 
agitators who deployed all their talents and 
acquirements, their knowledge of the language 
and acquaintance with the native religion, to 
rouse the natives against Russia and Great 



PAST AND PRESENT 265 

Britain. Abyssinia, although deprived by 
Italy of the presence of the German " scientific 
expedition," was induced by the German 
Minister at Adis Abeba to behave in such a 
way that in the month of March 1916 King 
Victor's Government found it advisable to 
issue a decree ordering urgent fortifications 
to be constructed in Erythea. 1 Sweden has 
been provided with war news and political 
information free of charge by the generous 
Press Bureau of Berlin. In Belgium persever- 
ing exertions have been put forth to sow discord 
between Flemings and Walloons. In China, 
where a British adviser is employed by the 
Chief of the State, Yuan Shih Kai has turned 
a willing ear to the mentors from the Father- 
land, with results which bear the hall mark of 
Germany. In Mexico Villa's murderous raids 
on American territory, instigated, it is asserted, 
by German emissaries, compelled United States 
troops to pursue him over the frontiers, and 
raised an issue which may be decided only by 
a regular campaign. Thus Teuton diplomacy, 
at whose failures we are so prone to rail, con- 
trived on the one hand to pass off the assassina- 
tions of Americans on board the Lusitania as 
a justifiable act, and on the other to present 
the New Mexico murder, which was the work 
of a mere savage, as such an outrage on the 
law of nations as warrants the employment of 
military force. 2 

1 On March 16, 1916. 

2 The New York World, in a leading article published 
March 13, writes : " No pacifist proclaims the doctrine 
that, although Americans had a legal right to live near 
the border, they should have taken themselves out of the 
danger zone in the interest of peace. No German- 
American Alliance holds meetings to proclaim the dead 
at Columbus as ' Guardian angels.' No German language 



266 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

That same diplomacy, seconded by the 
press organization which invented facts and 
moulded opinion, scored successes in Bulgaria, 
Greece, Roumania, Switzerland, and contrived 
not only to keep Italy from declaring war 
against Germany, but to negotiate a treaty 
for the protection of German property there. 
Despite its clumsiness and arrogance and 
brutality, German diplomacy is unmatched as 
an agency for rousing popular forces in civilized 
and uncivilized countries into subversive excite- 
ment. It surrounded the Pope of Rome with 
philo-German dignitaries, gave him an Austrian 
as adviser, and permeated the Vatican with 
an atmosphere of Kultur which even pious 
Catholics of non-Teuton countries avoid as 
mephitic. It caught the Sultan and his Young 
Turks, Anglophile and Francophile, in its toils, 
and gave its warm approbation to the massacre 
of the Armenians. It won over the young 
Shah of Persia, who, with great difficulty and 
only after strenuous exertions, was kept from 
going over bodily to the Turkish camp. It 
bought the services of the Senussi. It is 
making headway with the Negus of Abyssinia. 

newspaper has spoken of the New Mexico massacre as 
undertaken in a holy cause, or referred to the President 
as incapable of understanding either German militarism 
or German Kultur. Yet the Americans who were assas- 
sinated on the Lusitania and the Arabic had as much 
right to be where they were as the Americans who were 
dragged from their beds at Columbus and slaughtered. 
The Lusitania murder was deliberately planned and 
ordered by the Government in Berlin, Avhich has assumed 
full responsibility therefore, and presented but one excuse, 
that its victims were unexpectedly numerous. The New 
Mexico murder was planned and executed by a savage, 
with no pretence that there is a Government behind him, 
the guilt of the outlaw of the border being not one whit 
less than that of the outlaw of the sea." 



PAST AND PRESENT 267 

It offered a bribe to Italian socialists and found 
work for Italian anarchists, whose representa- 
tives were received in the palace of the Kaiser's 
Ambassador in Rome. And — most difficult 
task of all — it reconciled, at least for a time, 
the interests of Bulgaria with those of Greece 
and Roumania. 

German diplomacy has often misread foreign 
political situations, mistaken the trend of 
national opinion and sentiment and failed to 
achieve ends which might by dint of mere 
patience and quiescence have been readily 
accomplished. For it has no psychological 
standard by which to measure the nobler 
qualities of a foreign people, however closely 
it may have studied their politics, their history 
and their vices. Its tests are for the lower 
grades of human character, and with these it 
has indeed achieved extraordinary things. 

Thus, with infinite labour the Teuton mind 
has grappled with the chaotic welter produced 
by the European war. But, besides the skilful 
handling of great financial and kindred problems, 
its assiduity in watching for and readiness to 
seize opportunities for dealing with the issues 
of lesser moment is worth noting, were it only 
for its value as a stimulus. One instance 
occurred in the very first sitting of the Reich- 
stag after hostilities had begun. The legis- 
lature agreed to introduce a slight reform of 
the law, dealing with the rights of children born 
out of wedlock, of whom there are in Germany 
185,000 a year. The Government assented 
to the change, which was embodied in a bill 
affirming the right of the illegitimate children 
of soldiers fallen in battle to the same pension 
as if their parents had been legally married. 
And the Reichstag passed the, bill unanimously. 



268 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

This solicitude about little things is most 
saliently in evidence in the military domain. 
Here nothing is neglected that can contribute 
to the fighting value of the units. Hence the 
care shown for the nourishment and comfort 
of the soldiers. Ruthlessly though they are 
sacrificed in battle, they are well looked after 
in the trenches, and their career is followed 
with interest and recorded with accuracy by 
their superiors. I was struck with the com- 
pleteness of the information which the German 
War Office possesses and can produce at a 
moment's notice about any individual soldier. 
It was brought home to me in this way. The 
Chief of the Berlin police had a grandson in 
the war who had been missed for several weeks. 
Desirous of obtaining particulars about his 
capture or death, he asked a neutral friend to 
obtain information from the Russians. And 
by way of furnishing a description he sent a 
printed card, which I read. It contained the 
name and age of the soldier, the regiment to 
which he belonged, the hamlet in which he was 
last seen, the distances that separated that 
hamlet from the next town and the next large 
city, the day, the hour and the minute when the 
man together with his comrades were attacked, 
and the number of Russians who attacked 
them. And all these printed particulars refer 
to a private soldier ! Is there anything com- 
parable to this to be found in any of the allied 
countries ? 

The scene of another characteristic fact that 
struck me was Brussels. Princess L. requested 
permission from the German authorities to 
repair to France to visit her mother, who, she 
explained, was ill. At the Kommandantur her 
request was met with the cutting remark that 



PAST AND PRESENT 269 

many persons had been applying for permits 
to visit their mothers, sisters and other rela- 
tions abroad, who all appeared to be victims 
of some mysterious epidemic. Still, the official 
added, he would not definitively refuse the 
request, but would accord it as soon as he had 
proof that the lady's mother was really ill. 
" We shall have inquiries made." " But you 
cannot have inquiries made in France during 
the war," she objected. " Just as quickly as 
in peace time," he retorted. Sceptical and sad 
the petitioner returned home. But in a day 
or two she was summoned to the Komman- 
dantur and informed that her statement had 
been verified, her mother lay ill — the malady 
was mentioned — and she was permitted to go. 
The Germans have eyes and ears in all the 
countries of their adversaries. 

One can readily imagine the painful kind of 
questions that will arise in the mind of an 
intelligent ally who realizes for the first time 
how great are the inventive and organizing 
talents of the Teuton, how unswerving his 
resolve, how tenacious he is of purpose, and how 
unconscious most of us still are of the need of 
bestirring ourselves to compete with him on 
terms of equality. The German's striving is 
one, but all-embracing. His means are count- 
less, for they are restricted by no limitations. 
In his search for tools and agents he enters into 
human nature, but not in its entire compass ; 
only into the baser parts, so that his estimate 
is often erroneous and his expectations are 
unfulfilled. But even when ample deduction 
has been made for these failures, the odds 
remaining in his favour are formidable, and will 
continue undiminished unless and until we 
realize our plight, shuffle off the cramping coils 



270 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

of conservatism, insularity and self-complac- 
ency and brace ourselves to the most strenuous, 
the most painful effort we have ever yet put 
forth. On our capacity to effect this inward 
change, rather than upon any diplomatic 
arrangements, depends the issue of the struggle 
which will begin when military and naval 
hostilities have come to an end. 



CHAPTER XX 

PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 

Plain though these facts are, the Entente 
nations, and in particular the British people, 
either ignore them wholly or misinterpret their 
purport. Hence we continue absorbed in the 
pursuit of interests, parochial and parlia- 
mentary, which though quite human, are 
utterly off the line of racial and imperial 
progress. We obstinately shut our eyes to the 
magnitude of the Sphinx question that con- 
fronts us, and we address ourselves to one — 
and that the least important— of its many 
facets, and content ourselves with tackling 
that. We descant upon the turpitude of the 
Teuton who from the regions of idealism in 
which Goethe, Herder and their contempo- 
raries dwelt has sunk into shift, treason and 
murder, and we proclaim our faith in the 
ultimate triumph of right, justice and of the 
democracy in which alone they nourish. But 
this frame of mind, which moves us to identify 
ourselves with all that is best in humanity, if 
cultivated will prove fatal. It accustoms us 
to dangerous hallucinations. We assume that 
we are the chosen people, and we neglect the 
virtues which alone would justify our election. 
For generations we have been reaping and 
wasting, instead of ploughing and sowing. 
We have been living on our capital, nay, on 
our credit, and have long since overdrawn our 

271 



272 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

account. Our successes in the past, sometimes 
the result of fortuitous circumstances, more 
often of the blunders of our rivals, inspire a 
presumptuous confidence in successes for the 
future and a conviction that come what may 
we are destined to muddle through. A special 
providence is watching over us — a cousin 
German to the Kaiser's " good old God. ? ' In 
truth we are tempting Fate, postulating an 
exception to the law of cause and effect, and 
looking for Hebrew miracles in the twentieth 
century after Christ. 

Were it otherwise, the nation would not have 
continued to entrust its destinies to the men 
who misguided it consistently and perseveringly 
for so many years, to the watchmen who saw 
nothing of the rocks and sandbanks ahead 
which it was their function to discern and their 
duty to avoid, and who are now unwittingly 
but effectually deluding the people into believ- 
ing that the present campaign, which is but 
a single episode in a long- spun- out contest, is 
an independent event which began in August 
1914 and may end this year or the next. 
These same leaders are busily inculcating the 
delusive notion that the diplomatic instrument 
which will one day close hostilities will be a 
treaty of peace. And they are seemingly pre- 
pared to negotiate its terms on that assumption. 

In truth, we are engaged in a duel which 
began thirty years ago, gave the Germans such 
booty as Heligoland, their world-trade, their 
wealth, their formidable navy, their Baghdad 
Railway, their various overseas colonies, their 
European Allies, and the enormous resources 
with which when this acute phase of the con- 
test is over they will re-transfer the venue to 
the economic and political domains and carry 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 273 

on the struggle with greater vigour than before. 
And peace terms concluded on any other 
supposition cannot be conducive to the national 
welfare. We are locked in a deadly embrace 
with a compact people of 120,000,000, of in- 
domitable spirit, boundless resources, un- 
quenchable faith and a single aim. Yet we 
are already looking forward to the time in the 
near future when our intercourse, however 
circumscribed, with this nation will be essen- 
tially pacific, and when we can revert to our 
cherished narrow interests and our easy-going 
dilettantism. We feed upon the hope that in 
a few brief years the British nation will have 
got safely back to its old beaten grooves, and 
not only business and sport but everything 
else will go on as usual. Yet all the salient 
facts which force themselves on our attention 
to-day, all the decisive events of the past thirty 
years are cogent proofs of the unbroken se- 
quence of a trial of strength which the future 
historian and the present statesman, if there 
be one, must characterize as a life-and-death 
struggle between the champions of the new 
Teuton politico-social ordering and the parti- 
sans of the old. But after the lapse of a genera- 
tion and with the record of all our losses before 
us, we have not yet formed a right conception 
of the situation, and its issues, or of the historic 
forces at work. In these circumstances, no 
degree of sagacity can help us to devise the 
only policy in which salvation resides. The 
prevailing mistaken conception must be recti- 
fied before any headway can be made against 
the currents that are fast bearing us down. 
And the time at our disposal is brief. 

It needs few words to characterize the 
effects which the dreamy optimism of the 



274 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Entente nations had on their method of 
mobilizing their resources to carry on the war. 
Taken unawares they had nothing ready. 
Misapprehending the nature of the issues and 
the redoubtable character of the contest, they 
pursued subordinate aims with insufficient 
means. The most daring strategical moves of 
the enemy, in war as in diplomacy, they 
ridiculed as either bluff or madness. The 
journalistic campaign in neutral countries they 
scoffed at as vain, and put their faith in the 
final triumph of truth. Their financial meas- 
ures, oscillating from one extreme to another, 
denoted the absence of any settled plan, of any 
clear-cut picture of the needs of the moment. 
The odds in their favour, which circumstance 
had given and circumstance might take away 
again, they looked upon as inalienable, until 
they ended by forfeiting them all. Viewing 
the campaign as a transient event, the British 
Government prosecuted it by means of make- 
shifts, instead of radical measures. Obligatory 
service was scouted at as un-English. Dis- 
criminating customs tariffs were condemned as 
heretical. It was not until the enemy had 
occupied Poland, overrun Serbia, driven the 
Allied troops from the Dardanelles, bent 
Montenegro to the yoke, threatened Egypt, 
Riga and Petrograd, that some rays of light 
penetrated the atmosphere of ignorance and 
prejudice through which the Allies surveyed the 
European welter. They had begun by counting 
upon the breaking up of the Habsburg 
Monarchy. They felt sure that the Tsar's 
armies would capture Budapest and advance 
on Berlin. They planned the defeat of Ger- 
many by famine. They built another fabric 
of hopes on " Kitchener's Great Army " in 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 275 

the spring of 1915. But one after another 
these anticipations were belied by events. 
And now the nation blithely accepts the 
further forecasts of the men who are chargeable 
with this long sequence of avoidable errors. 

Respect for individual liberty was carried 
to such a point in Great Britain that organiza- 
tions against recruiting were tolerated in 
England and Ireland, and strikes, which not 
only inflicted heavy pecuniary losses on the 
nation but actually stopped its supplies of 
munitions and brought it within sight of dis- 
comfiture, were treated with soft words and 
immediate concessions. One cannot read even 
Mr. Lloyd George's summary narrative of the 
preposterous doings of British slackers without 
wondering whether salvation is still possible. 
These men not only refused to work their best 
for the community, but forbade their comrades 
to work well. At Enfield, we are told, a man 
was obliged by trade union regulations so to 
regulate his work that he did not earn more 
than Is. an hour, though he could easily 
have earned 25. Qd. 1 Another man was doing 
two and a half days' work in two days, and 
when he refused to carry out the behest of the 
Ironfounders' Board to waste the other half 
day he was fined £l. 2 A consequence of this 
anti-national attitude was that " we had to 
wait for weeks in Birmingham with machinery 
lying idle, with our men without rifles, with 
our men with a most inadequate supply of 
machine guns to attack the enemy and defend 
themselves." 3 Every one will re-echo the 
Minister's comment on the outlook, if this 

1 Mr. Lloyd George's speech at Bristol. Cf. Daily 
Telegraph, September 10, 1915. 

2 Ibid. a j bidm 



276 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

attitude is persisted in — " we are making 
straight for disaster." 

Compare this state of things with that 
which rules in Germany. It is a British 
Minister who describes it : "If you want to 
realize what organized labour in this war 
means, read the story of the last twelve months. 
By the end of September the German armies 
were checked. They sustained an over- 
whelming defeat in France, Russia was ad- 
vancing against them towards the Carpathians, 
and I believe in East Prussia. That is not 
the case to-day. Why ? The German work- 
men came in; organized labour in Germany 
prepared to take the field. They worked and 
worked quietly, persistently, continuously, with- 
out stint or strife, without restriction for months 
and months, through the autumn, through the 
winter, through the spring. Then came that 
avalanche of shot and shell which broke the 
great Russian armies and drove them back. 
That was the victory of the German workmen." x 

Great Britain is the classic land of strikes. 
Strikers are sacred among us. Industrial com- 
pulsion is rank heresy. 

That is one of our difficulties, and by no 
means the least formidable. The nation, de- 
spite the superb example of patriotic heroism 
given by all classes, parties, provinces and 
colonies of the Empire, is still deficient in 
cohesiveness. No fire of enthusiasm has yet 
burned fiercely enough among all sections of 
the Empire and all members of the race to 
fuse them in such a compact unified organism 
as we behold in the Teuton's Fatherland. 
Read the characteristic given of us by the 

1 Mr. Lloyd George's speech at Bristol. Cf. Daily 
Telegraph, September 10, 1915. 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 277 

ex- German Minister Dernburg, and say whether 
it is over-coloured. Discoursing on the diffi- 
culties which Britain has to cope with in 
carrying on the war, he says : " They are 
intensified ... by the narrow-minded cus- 
toms of the English trade unions, which con- 
trast with the patriotic behaviour of the 
German associations of the like nature as night 
contrasts with day." x This is melancholy 
reading for those whose hopes are fervent for a 
bright future of the British race, and it prepares 
them to listen in anxious silence to the general 
conclusion at which the Prussian ex-Minister 
arrives : " It is in the highest degree improb- 
able," he says, " that after the winding up 
of this contest England will be able to keep 
or wield any form of economic superiority 
whatever over Germany." 

In our Allies we find a strong touch of 
resemblance to ourselves. Their state of un- 
preparedness is amazing, if less desperate than 
ours. Russia, it is true, did much better at 
the outset than friend or foe anticipated, and 
she might have done quite well if only she had 
been supplied with munitions. But she had 
not nearly enough, and her armies were 
slaughtered like sheep in consequence. Then 
there were no boots for the soldiers, who were 
forced to wear thin canvas leggings with 
leather soles. And scores of waggon-loads of 
incapacitated men were taken to Petrograd 
and other cities whose feet had been frozen 
for lack of shoe-leather. One of the urgent 
wants of the Tsardom are railways, which the 
late Count Witte was so eager to construct. 
When hostilities opened, the insufficiency of 
communications became one of the decisive 
1 Berliner Tageblatt, March 9, 1916. 



278 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

factors in Russia's disasters. And it was 
heightened by the conduct of, shall we say, 
the prussianized officials, 1 who are reported to 
have disposed of waggons for large sums to 
greedy merchants, who used to raise the prices 
of the merchandise and batten on the misery 
of their fellows. 

Trains, needed to supply the fighting men 
at the front with food and the wounded at the 
rear with medicaments, were kept back to 
suit the schemes of these greedy cormorants. 
Gratuities, it is openly affirmed, had to be paid 
by Red Cross and other officers to those sub- 
ordinate railway servants who had it in their 
power to send on a train or shunt it off for 
days on a side-track. Bribery is working 
havoc in the Tsardom. In January 1916 the 
Moscow municipality discussed the advis- 
ability of voting a certain sum of money and 
putting it at the disposal of the chief officer 
of the city, to be discreetly employed in trans- 
actions with complacent railway officials, in 
order to further the work of reducing prices 
on necessaries of life. The motive adduced 
for this homoeopathic way of treating a social 
distemper were the conditions of life in Russia 
and the necessity of complying with them. 
But as the Statute Book does not recognize 
these conditions and condemns bribery abso- 
lutely, a vote on the subject was not taken. 2 

Acting on instructions issued by the Finance 
Minister, a Member of the Council of the 
Finance Ministry, D. I. Zassiadko, visited the 

1 It is but fair to say that venality is not one of the 
characteristics of the German bureaucracy. Their sense 
of duty towards the State is the nearest approach to 
morality of which they now seem capable. 

2 The German press gave great prominence to this 
item of news. Cf. Frankfurter Zeitung, January 8. 1916. 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 279 

Kharkoff circuit for the purpose of studying 
the bribery problem on the spot. M. Zas- 
siadko acquired the conviction " on the spot " 
that the railway officials do really take bribes, 
" and even of considerable amounts." But, 
that ascertained, the representative of the 
Ministry decided to delve deeper to the root 
of the matter. And he reached the conclusion 
that railway servants belong to the class of 
the tempted. The evil, he reported, resides 
not in the circumstance that they take bribes, 
but that bribes are offered whereby these weak 
little souls are seduced. The representative of 
the Ministry discovered an entire category of 
bribes which do not bear the signs of extortion, 
but only of " gratitude." To us this con- 
clusion sounds somewhat naive. The most 
widely circulated journal of Petrograd prefaces 
an article on the subject as follows. 1 

" The misdeeds of the officials and bribery 
on the railway system cry out to heaven," 
writes the organ of the Constitutional Demo- 
crats. " Compared with the reverses on the 
Carpathians and in Poland, the defeats we are 
sustaining in our own house and behind the 
enemy's back are much greater. . . ." On the 
important line Petrograd-Moscow-Perm scan- 
dalous cases of corruption took place in which, 
according to Russian journals, officials of a 
class who might reasonably be regarded as 
unbribable were implicated. They are alleged 
to have let out to firms of speculators for large 
sums of money, goods waggons which were 
already destined to carry consignments to the 
front. 2 Russia's purchases abroad have made 
a profound impression on the peoples in whose 

1 The Bourse Gazette, February 21. 

2 Cf. Reitch (about February 17, 1916), March 5, 1916. 



280 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

midst they were effected. The principles on 
which these transactions were carried on pro- 
voked lively comments. It is not that they 
revealed a superlative degree of disorganiza- 
tion. That touch would have merely marked 
the kinship of the men concerned with their 
allies. By the discovery that the Russian 
Government's purchasing Commissioners, the 
representatives of one of its embassies, the 
agents of the British Government and the 
equally zealous agents of the French Govern- 
ment were all secretly bidding against each 
other for the same rifles to be delivered to the 
Tsar's Ministers, only a smile of recognition was 
elicited. It may have seemed at once amusing 
and consolatory to find that all were tarred 
with the same brush. But when it was dis- 
covered that the offer of certain army neces- 
saries was put off for weeks and weeks, although 
they were to be had under cost price, and was 
then accepted at a much higher price, profound 
sympathy was felt for the Tsar's armies. 

Chaos, waste and a variety of abuses that 
pressed heavily on the poorer classes marked 
the efforts made by the Russian Government 
to cope with the scarcity of fuel, corn and other 
necessaries which began to be felt soon after 
the war. The rolling stock, it was complained, 
was utterly insufficient, yet it was found 
possible to transport 1,000,000 poods * weight 
of mineral water of doubtful quality. When 
trains arrived bringing supplies to the suffer- 
ing population, it turned out that there were 
no hands to unload the waggons. And when 
labour was requisitioned, vehicles were not 
to be had. In October 1915 on the rails of 
Moscow station five thousand waggons, laden 
1 A pood is equal to 36*11 lbs. 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 281 

with life's necessaries, stood waiting and wait- 
ing in vain for the unskilled labour which 
ought to have been abundant, considering the 
number of the population and of the refugees. 
At the same time 2000 wagons were on the 
rails of the Petrograd station, their contents 
lying unutilized. 1 "It is only by the lack of 
order and organization that one can explain 
the facts that in Petrograd the inhabitants have 
no butter, while in the places where butter is 
made it is being sold cheaper than before, at 
12 in lieu of 16 to 18 roubles a pood. In the 
province of Ekaterinograd, mines which own 
800,000 poods of coal cannot get more than a 
few waggon loads of it every month. 

Russia has incomparably more than enough 
fuel, without importing any, to satisfy all the 
needs of her 180,000,000 inhabitants. But 
owing to the insufficiency of communications, 
and still more to the lack of forethought and 
enterprise, the population of many cities and 
towns underwent serious hardships in conse- 
quence of the impossibility of acquiring coal or 
wood. In September 1915 the Petrograd region 
could obtain no more than 65 per cent, of the 
necessary quantity, and a month later only 49 
per cent. In Moscow the plight of the inhabit- 
ants was worse. In September they could get 
but 26 per cent, of their needs and in October 40 
per cent. According to the Minister of Com- 
merce, who volunteered these data, the con- 
dition of the towns of Rostoff, Novotcherkassk, 
Nakhitchevan, Taganrog, Ekaterinodar and 
others was not a whit better. The city of 
Vyatka was, according to the Novoye Vremya, 2 

1 Cf. Novoye Vremya, October 9, 1915. 

2 The German press welcomes items of information 
like this. Cf. Frankfurter Zeitung, January 13, 1916. 



282 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

in January 1916 without fuel, while the mer- 
cury registered 30 degrees Reaumur below 
freezing-point. The unfortunate citizens 
heated their homes with fragments of hoard- 
ings, tables, desks and stools. And yet there 
is abundant fuel in the superb forests with 
which Vyatka is surrounded, and, what is 
more to the point, the city authorities had 
received during the preceding spring 60,000 
roubles for the purpose of purchasing a supply 
of wood for the winter. But they did nothing, 
organization not being one of their strong 
points. 

Live stock in Russia has diminished during 
the war to a much larger extent than was 
anticipated. The peasantry, owing to the 
prohibition of alcohol, now consume from 150 
to 200 per cent, more meat than before, and 
what with the refugees from Poland, the 
prisoners of war and the increased needs of 
the army, no less than 20 per cent, of the 
cattle of the entire Empire was used during 
the first eighteen months 1 and 30 per cent, of 
the stock of all European Russia. In conse- 
quence of the shortage and of the irregularity 
of the transport, three days of abstinence 
from meat were ordained. Yet in January 
1916 a discovery was casually made in the 
Kieff forests between Byelitch and Pushtsha 
Voditzka, which caused considerable lifting 
of the eyebrows. About 8000 head of cattle 
and several thousand sheep were found with 
no cowherds, shepherds or owners, wandering 
about from place to place. Scores of them 
were succumbing to hunger and cold every day. 
The paths in the woods were covered with 
the dead bodies of kine, calves and sheep. The 
1 Over a hundred million head. 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 283 

journal which records this fact affirms that 
these herds belong to the Union of Zemstvos, 
which had purchased them from the peasants 
who had to flee from the occupied provinces. 
The President of the Union of Zemstvos is 
said to have confirmed this odd story with the 
qualification that the forlorn horned cattle and 
sheep are the property not of the Union of 
Zemstvos, but of the Ministry of Agriculture, 
which is alone answerable. 1 

The card system of distributing provisions 
that are scarce found its way first into Ger- 
many and then into Austria and Russia. But 
in the last-named empire it was much less 
successful than in the two first mentioned. 
According to the Petrograd journals in Pskoff, 
where it was tried, many individuals got no 
cards, and therefore no provisions. Many who 
possessed the cards found nothing to buy. 
And some of those who obtained the articles 
they wanted paid dearer for them than if they 
had bought them without cards. And as with 
cards one has to lay in a stock to last a 
fortnight, the poorer families were unable to 
utilize them. 2 

In France, as well as in Russia, the profes- 
sional organizers, especially the civilians, were 
very much adrift. In the army all the sterling 
qualities of the French nation at its best, and 
many that were deemed extinct, but are now 
seen to have been only dormant, shone forth 
resplendent. Valour, fortitude, staying power, 
self-abnegation for the common good, became 
household virtues. Friends and foes were 

1 Cf. the Russian journal, Kieff, also the Frankfurter 
Zeitung, January 29, 1916. 

2 Novoye Vremya, January 1916. Frankfurter Zeitung, 
January 21, 1916. 



284 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

equally surprised. But the civil administra- 
tion remained well-meaning, patriotic and 
unregenerate to the last. The old Adam lived 
and acted up to his reputation. 

Before the war the French railway adminis- 
tration had been criticized severely. It is not 
for a foreigner to express an opinion on the 
internal ordering of a country not his own, 
but unbiassed French experts found that the 
strictures were called for and the verdict, in 
which the public acquiesced, was well grounded. 
Subsequently, when the struggle began and the 
railway system was tested, people had reason 
to remember the previous complaints, for they 
saw how little had been done in the mean- 
while to remove the causes of dissatisfaction. 
The first drawback was the want of rolling 
stock. " Give us waggons and we will execute 
all orders and supply the War Ministry," cried 
the munitions firms. " There are no waggons 
in the ports, and we cannot get the coal 
delivered," exclaimed the importers. " The 
country is threatened with general paralysis," 
wrote the Journal; 1 "we can neither forward 
nor sell anything." The railway administra- 
tion asked for a fortnight's notice, then for 
three weeks and finally an indefinite period, 
before it could provide a single truck. " I 
have fertilizing stuff to forward before the 
season is past," pleads the representative of 
one firm. "We have no waggons," is the 
reply. " I must have my produce delivered 
at once to the Government," argues another, 
" for it is wanted for the fabrication of 
powder." But the answer came promptly : 
"There are no waggons." "But you have 
waggons. I see them over there " (the station 
1 Le Journal, November 26, 1915. 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 285 

was Cognac). " Yes, but we may not touch 
them. They belong to the military engineer- 
ing department." " Well, but what are they 
doing there ? " " Ah, that is none of our 
business." x 

And in the ports, at the termini, at inter- 
mediate stations, the merchandise lay heaped 
up, immobilized, while the merchants, the 
middlemen, the manufacturers, the Govern- 
ment, the army were waiting, time was lapsing, 
and the fate of the Republic and the nation 
hanging in the balance. At Havre great 
machines, destined for a Paris firm which was 
to have delivered them to factories making 
shells, lay untouched for two months. The 
number of shells lost in this way has never 
been calculated. Yet it was well known that 
during all that time there were numbers of 
waggons available. What had become of them ? 
The answer was : " They are to be found every- 
where, immobilized. It is a case of general 
immobilization of the rolling stock. People 
slept in them, turned them into cottages, used 
them as warehouses, each individual reason- 
ing that one waggon more or less would not 
be missed. And as this argument was used 
by large numbers of easy-going, well-meaning 
people the result was appalling. 

The most terrific war known to history was 
ragmg in three Continents, and one group of 
belligerents, unaware or heedless of the magni- 
tude of the issues, kept wasting its enormous 
resources and throwing away its advantages. 
At the little station of Cognac waggons laden 
with all kinds of war materials, barbed wire, 
galvanized wire, etc., were detained from 
September 1914 until November 1915, 400 
1 Le Journal, November 26, 1915. 



286 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

days in all, doing nothing. Forty -two waggons 
ready to move were found on two grass- 
covered rails. Fourteen waggons were there 
since September 1914. Eight since December 
of the same year, twenty since June. Alto- 
gether at the modest little station of Cognac 
the total recorded by Senator Humbert's 
Journal was 228,500 tons-days. " All this 
during the most tremendous war the world has 
ever witnessed, in which hundreds of thou- 
sands of men have been slain, where we have 
continually been short of war material, while 
industry and commerce are. agonizing for lack 
of means of transport. It may well seem a 
dream." x 

Seven hundred French railway stations were 
devoid of rolling stock. On the other hand, 
from the beginning of the war down to Novem- 
ber 1915, 729 waggons were lying immobilized 
at the station of Blanc-Mesnil. Seven hun- 
dred and twenty-nine ! 2 Merchants, manufac- 
turers, importers, all were being literally 
beggared for lack of transports while hun- 
dreds of waggons lay rotting at obscure little 
stations for over a year. " The whole region 
of the West is encumbered," we read, " with 
30,000,000 hectolitres of apples, valued at 
300,000,000 francs, which cannot be conveyed 
anywhither, and which people are beginning to 
bury in the earth as manure. Sugar is scarce 
and is rising in price, whereas ever since last 
August 3 a single firm has unloaded 10,000 
tons of sugar at Havre which it cannot have 
transported to Paris. Innumerable army pur- 

1 Le Journal, November 26, 1915. 

2 Le Journal, December 2, 1915. They were photo- 
graphed and the photograph reproduced in that paper. 

3 That was published in December 1915. 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 287 

veyors are unable to send the machines for the 
shells. . . . An official order to the army pre- 
scribed a substitute for barbed wire, which 
was not to be had at any price, yet at a single 
station at least 135 tons of barbed wire were 
lying for a twelvemonth unused, untouched. 1 
On November 27, 1915, the military hospital 
N16 at Poitiers needed coal. A request was 
made by telephone. The reply received was : 
" We have coal at La Rochelle, but there 
are no waggons to carry it." Yet there were 
forty -two waggons immobilized at Cognac, 729 
at Blanc-Mesnil and 121 standing laden with 
barbed wire and other materials for over a 
year ! 

Organization and intelligence ! 

With engines the experience was the same. 
The French Government, anxious to make up 
for the deficiency, purchased 140 engines of 
British make to be delivered some time in 
1916. Yet at that time there were at the 
station of Mezidon (Calvados) over 500 engines 
immobilized, nobody knew why or by whom. 
This cemetery of locomotives was photographed 
by the Journal. Such was the harvest reaped 
by the enterprising Senator Humbert's com- 
mission at that one station. There were 
others. At Maries six Belgian engines, at 
Serquigny twenty, etc. 

The attention of the French authorities 
having been called to this unqualifiable neg- 
lect, a senatorial railway commission was 
appointed to inquire into the matter, and it 
reported that : " The engines in question, 
numbering about 2000, of which 1000 on the 
State railway system are now going to be 
repaired." " There are therefore 2000 engines 
1 Le Journal, December 2, 1915. 



288 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

scandalously abandoned," comments the Jour- 
nal, ..." forgotten during sixteen months, 
and having passed from the state of being 
inutilized to that of being inutilizable. For 
if these machines, which were in service before 
the war and came from Belgium, are to-day, 
like the waggons of Blanc-Mesnil, incapable 
of being utilized in their present state, as the 
official note puts it, the reason is that they 
were left to decay in the rain and the wind 
without cover or case for five hundred days." * 

Interesting in a smaller way is the reply 
given by the French War Minister to a ques- 
tion by a deputy, the Marquis de Ludre, who 
asked for information about a consignment 
of knives which had been provided for the 
army, but were found to be quite useless. 
The Minister explained that the General- 
issimus having requested the immediate dis- 
patch of 165,000 knives, the department 
charged with the execution of the order had 
no time to examine the goods, and the cir- 
cumstance was overlooked that all kinds of 
knives were supplied, without any reference 
to the purpose for which they were destined. 2 
The Minister added that no one should be 
blamed for this, inasmuch as it was " the 
result of exaggerated but praiseworthy zeal." 
This construction is charitable and may be 
true in fact. But the soldiers who, in lieu 
of a serviceable blade, found themselves in 
possession of a dessert knife may have taken 
a different view of the transaction. 

This is hardly what is understood by 
organization. 

Beside those scenes from chaos set this 

1 Le Journal, December 4, 1915. 

2 Journal Official, answer to question No. 5730. 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 289 

picture of order : "In a small French town 
in which the supreme etape commando of 
Kluck's army was situated, we inspected a 
field postal station. On the ground floor the 
letters were being received and delivered. 
The stream of soldiers was endless. They 
were sending field postcards, which are for- 
warded gratuitously. The difficult work of 
sorting the correspondence was being trans- 
acted on the first storey. Every day from 
1800 to 2000 post sacks arrive, mostly with 
small packets and postcards, and day after 
day the same difficult problem presents itself — 
how to find the addressee. Many regiments, 
it is true, have permanent quarters, but there 
are mobile columns as well. Quick transfers 
are possible, and individuals may be shifted 
to another place or incorporated in a different 
regiment. The arranging of the correspond- 
ence went forward in a spacious room; the 
letters which it was difficult to deliver were 
handed over to a number of specialists, who sat 
in an adjoining apartment and studied all the 
changes caused by the transfer of troops. 
They found help in an address-book contain- 
ing a list of all the field formations. About 
once every four days, or even oftener, a new 
edition of this work was issued. By the middle 
of December 1914 the eighty-fourth edition 
was in print." 1 

This talent for organization, this capacity 
of thought concentration in circumstances 
which tend to strengthen emotion at the cost 
of reason, have been constantly displayed by 
our enemies throughout the entire struggle 
of the past thirty years, and never more con- 
spicuously than during the present war. Every 
1 Karl Hildebrand, Ein Starkes Volk, p. 108. 



290 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

emergency found them ready. The most un- 
likely eventualities had been foreseen and 
provided for. Private initiative, which 
" grandmotherly legislation " was supposed 
to have killed, was more alert and resourceful 
than among any of the Entente nations. 
Every German is in some respects an agent 
of his Government. Each one thinks he 
foresees some eventuality with the genesis of 
which he is especially conversant, and he 
forthwith communicates his forecast and at 
the same time his plan for coping with the 
danger to some official. And all suggestions 
are thankfully received and dealt with on 
their intrinsic merits. For such matters the 
rulers of the Empire, however engrossed by 
urgent problems, have always time and money. 

It is instructive and may possibly be help- 
ful to compare this spirit of detachment from 
the personal and party elements of the situa- 
tion, this accessibility to every call of patriotic 
duty, this self-possession under conditions 
calculated to hinder calm deliberation, with 
the hesitations, the bewilderment, the con- 
flicting decisions of the Entente leaders and 
their impatience of unauthorized initiative 
and offers of private assistance. Outsiders 
are not wanted. Their money is not rejected, 
but nothing else that they tender is readily 
received. 

In other more momentous matters the 
Allies also lagged behind their adversaries. 
Despite their vast resources and the generous 
offers of private help, the care taken of the 
wounded left a good deal to be desired. The 
articles on this subject which were published 
in the London Press provided ample food for 
bitter reflection. In France, at the beginning 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 291 

of the war, wounded soldiers, after receiving 
first aid, were conveyed for days in carts over 
uneven roads to the hospitals in which they 
were to be treated. An American gentleman, 
witnessing the sufferings of these victims of 
circumstance, collected a number of motors 
in which to have them transported rapidly 
and with relative comfort. But his offer of 
these conveyances was rejected by all the 
departments to which he applied. And it 
was only after he had spent weeks in visiting 
influential friends in London that he finally 
obtained an introduction to the Secretary for 
War, who, overriding the decisions of his 
subordinates, closed with the proposal and 
sent the benefactor with his motors to the 
front. 

It has been affirmed by unbiassed neutral 
witnesses who evinced special interest in the 
subject that tens of thousands of the allied 
wounded who died of their injuries might 
have been saved had they had proper care. 
But defective organization and other avoid- 
able causes deprived them of efficient medical 
help. 

By Great Britain more comprehensive meas- 
ures were fitfully taken, of which our wounded 
have reaped the benefit. A French journal l 
enumerated, with a high tribute of praise, the 
results of the observations made by a com- 
mission of British physicians in the Grand 
Palais Hospital in Paris : " More than half, 
to be exact 54 per cent., of the wounded 
entrusted to the care of the doctors of the 
Grand Palais since last May have been sent 
back to the front, completely cured. What 
an achievement 1 " Undoubtedly it is a feat 
1 The Figaro, February 22, 1916. 



292 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

to be proud of, if we compare it with the 
percentage of cured in certain other countries 
and in the Dardanelles. But if we set it side 
by side with what is claimed for and by the 
Germans, it may appear less remarkable. It 
cannot be gainsaid that the British authorities 
have spared neither money nor pains to alleviate 
the sufferings and heal the injuries of the 
wounded. And if the measure of their success 
is still capable of being extended, the reason 
certainly does not lie in any lack of good will. 

On the incapacitated German soldier every 
possible care is bestowed. His every need is 
foreseen and when possible provided for with 
an eye to thoroughness and economy. Waste 
and niggardliness are sedulously eschewed. 
Every man is provided with a square of canvas 
with eyelets, which serves as a carpet on which 
he lies at night, as a stretcher on which, 
when wounded, he is carried to the place 
where he can have his injuries attended to, 
and which, when he is killed, is used as a 
winding-sheet. The medical organization of 
the army is as thorough as the military. And 
the results attained justify the solicitude dis- 
played. From month to month the percentage 
of wounded who are able to return to the front 
has been augmenting steadily, and the death- 
rate has decreased correspondingly. During 
the first month of the war, out of every hundred 
wounded there were 84*8 capable of further 
service, 3*0 dead, and 12*2 incapacitated or 
sent home. In September of the same year 
the number of those able to return to the front 
rose to 88' 1, or about 4 per cent. more. And 
at the same time the death-rate sank from 
3 to 2 # 7 per cent. In the third month the 
proportion of soldiers able to resume their 



PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 293 

places in the ranks of fighters was 88*9, while 
the deaths had been reduced to 2*4. During 
the period beginning with November and 
ending in March the number of the wounded 
who went back to the front oscillated between 
87 # 3 and 88'9. In November the percentage 
of deaths was only 2*1 per cent., and in 
December only 1*7 per cent. January 1916 
showed a further improvement, the death- 
rate having fallen to 1*4 and in February 1*3 
per cent. During the two following months 
the percentage rose again to 1*4, but declined 
slowly until in June and July it had descended 
to 1*2 per cent. The number of wounded men 
who were sent back to their places at the 
front had meanwhile increased by April to 
91*2, and by June 1915 to 91*7, and in May and 
July to 91*8. Seven per cent, were wholly 
incapacitated or dismissed to their homes. 
Among the latter a considerable percentage 
returned subsequently to the ranks. Alto- 
gether, then, about 91*8 per cent, of the 
wounded German soldiers who fall in battle 
are so well taken care of that they are able to 
fight again, and no more than 1*2 per cent, of 
the total number succumb to their wounds. 1 

This strict conformity to the material and 
psychological conditions of success marks the 
method by which the Germans proceed to 
realize a grandiose plan which is understood 
and furthered by one and all. Their talent 
for organization, their insight, their inventive- 
ness, and their highly developed social sense 
are all pressed into the service of this patriotic 
cause. And it is to these permanent qualities, 
more even than to their thirty years' military 
and economic preparation, that they owe 
1 Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift. 



294 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

their many successes. The cynicism and 
ruthlessness of our arch-enemy should not be 
allowed to blind us to his enterprise, his 
stoicism, his meticulous applications of the 
law of cause and effect. These are among 
his most valuable assets, and unless we have 
solid advantages of our own to set against 
and outweigh them, our appeals to the justice 
of our cause and our denunciations of his 
wicked designs will avail us nothing. It is 
to our interest to seek out and note whatever 
strength is inherent in himself or his methods 
and to appropriate that. The struggle will 
ultimately be decided by the superiority of 
equipment, material and moral, which one 
side possesses over the other. As for the 
conceptions of public law and international 
right which the antagonists severally stand 
for, they must be gauged by quite other 
standards than heavy guns and asphyxiating 
gases. It is not impossible that in the course 
of time, and by dint of reciprocal action and 
reaction, the German views may be sufficiently 
modified and moralized to render possible the 
usual process of assimilation with which the 
history of speculative ideas and social move- 
ments has rendered us familiar. Meanwhile, 
truth compels us to admit that part at least 
of the western system is being overtaken by 
decay, and stands in need of speedy and 
thorough renovation. 



CHAPTER XXI 

THE FINAL ISSUE 

To come victorious out of the present ordeal 
— if, indeed, that be possible with the leaders, 
principles, methods and strivings that still 
characterize us — will not suffice to effect the 
triumph of our cause. The present, momentous 
though it be, cannot with safety be separated in 
thought or action from the future. The struggle 
will go on relentlessly after this campaign until 
one side has worsted the other definitively. 
And it is for that struggle that it behoves us to 
prepare while the war is still at its height. 

The Germans, true to their practice, have 
set us the example. Their curious combina- 
tions for dividing the Allies while negotiating 
their own schemes for reorganizing political 
Europe have been worked out in almost every 
detail. Their projects for creating a vast and 
powerful economic organization, to be known 
as Central Europe, 1 with its first appendix in 
the Balkan Peninsula, have been carefully 
woven, and will be duly embellished when 
the hour for unfolding them has struck. In 
a word, when opportunity suddenly appears 
like the bridegroom of the Gospel, the German 
will be found waiting, with girded loins and 
trimmed lamp. He has distributed the parts 
of each nation in the international drama, and 
if the roles cannot be taken over to-morrow, 
he will wait until the day after. 

The world is henceforth no longer a field of 
labour for the individual. Co-operation is 

1 Cf. Friedrich Naumann, Mitteleuropa. 
295 



296 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

the open sesame to the economic life of the 
future. And co-operation means organization. 
Organization, then, is the Alpha and Omega 
of the new era. That is the mysterious radium 
which has enabled a single race to assail and 
hold its own against a group of powers whose 
territory and population are many times 
greater than its own. That race has demon- 
strated the quasi-omnipotence of organized 
labour, and has thereby itself become almost 
omnipotent. On the success or failure of its 
adversaries to create a like force and rise to 
the same height depends the future of Europe 
and the British Empire. One of the first 
corollaries of the new principle is the enlarge- 
ment of all great units, including political 
communities. Germany and Austria, therefore, 
are bound, if not precisely to coalesce in one 
whole, at least to co-operate and combine for 
their common ends against common competitors, 
and thus to form the nucleus of that federal state 
which is, our enemies hope, one day to be com- 
mensurate with the continent of Europe. 

At present, however satisfactory the military 
situation may be said to be, the general outlook 
is far from bright. Our aims are impoverished, 
our creative energies are clogged by prejudice, 
our political vision is narrowed by party goals, 
and the forces inherent in the nation which should 
be employed in readjusting its life to the new 
conditions are being frittered away in abortive 
efforts to neutralize dissolvent ideas that are sap- 
ping only those organs of our social and political 
system which are already vicious or decayed. 
The waste of the empire's resources has no parallel 
in history. Supreme confusion marks our internal 
condition. Our leaders have done nothing to 
familiarize the nation with the dangers that 



THE FINAL ISSUE 297 

threaten it, the means by which they should be 
met, or with the social and political ideas which 
are destined to shape and sway the new order 
of things which is already close at hand. 

In the absence of constructive leaders it is 
for the nation itself to make due preparation 
for the momentous changes in the social and 
political system of Europe to which the 
present crisis is but the prelude. 

And although much has been spoken and 
written on the subject since the war began, 
little permanent work has as yet been done. 
And there are few signs of a radical change 
for the better. The confusion and incongru- 
ousness that mark the ideas of the reformers, 
and the hesitancy and conflicting interests of 
politicians make one dubious of the outcome of 
the present contest. Almost everything essen- 
tial would appear to be still lacking to the 
Allies, and the nature of the coming " peace 
period " is not realized, because the war is 
looked upon as an isolated phenomenon which 
began in July 1914, and will end when hostili- 
ties have ceased. Another belief equally mis- 
leading and mischievous is that the Teuton 
race can be paralysed if not crushed, and that 
for fifty or sixty years to come no revival of 
its energies, no recrudescence of its morbid 
aggressiveness need be apprehended. If we 
continue to shape our conduct on that assump- 
tion we may find ourselves one day in a 
Serbonian bog from which there is no rescue. 
However stringent the conditions which the 
Allies may be able to impose on their enemies, 
there will still remain a keen, strenuous, irre- 
pressible race of at least a hundred and twenty 
millions, endowed with rare capacities for 
organization, cohesion, self-sacrifice and perse- 



298 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

verance, whom no treaties can bind, no scruples 
can restrain, no dangers intimidate. At any 
moment a new invention, a favourable diplo- 
matic combination, would suffice to move them 
to burst all bounds and resume the military, 
naval and aerial contest anew. 

Even now, while the war is still raging, they 
are busy with comprehensive plans for the 
economic struggle which will succeed it. Nor 
are they content to weave schemes. They 
have already begun to carry them out. To 
mention but a few of the less important 
enterprises, as symptoms of the German 
solicitude for detail, there was a numerous 
gathering of railway representatives, Austrian, 
Hungarian and German, in August 1915, to 
consider the means of readjusting the railway 
service to the conditions which the peace 
would usher in. Among the projects laid 
before the meeting and insisted on by various 
financial institutions was the reconstruction 
on a new basis of the Sleeping Car Company, 
from which Belgian capital is to be excluded. 1 

In Italy many of the German commercial 
houses are, so to say, hibernating during the war. 
They merely altered their names and substituted 
well-paid, friendly Italians for Germans, and 
the feat was achieved. In this way the Kaiser's 
mercury mines of Abbadia, San Salvatore and 
Corte Vecchia in Tuscany are being protected, 
and nobody in Italy is under any misapprehen- 
sion as to what is going on there. They are 
nominally in the hands of Swiss. 

One of the most successful manoeuvres by 
which the Germans have already parried the 
strokes of their rivals in the economic struggle 

1 Giornale del havori pubblici. Cf . also Giornale d' 'Italia, 
August 22, 1915. 



THE FINAL ISSUE 299 

is by crossing the frontiers and carrying on 
the contest in the enemy's country. It was 
thus that, when Russia, by way of protecting 
her own nascent textile industries, levied 
heavy duties on imports from abroad, the 
Germans transported their plant and their 
workmen across the border, built extensive 
works in Lodz which gradually grew into a 
prosperous German city and rendered sterling 
services to the Teuton invader during the 
present war. They intend to have recourse 
to the same device as soon as hostilities have 
ceased. German trade papers announced this 
to their readers and urged them to com- 
municate with the staff with a view to receiving 
information respecting ways and means. 

One Berlin trade journal — the most widely 
circulated in the German capital — had recently 
a great headline entitled : " How to keep up 
German Exportation after the War ! " After 
a preamble enumerating the difficulties that 
would be thrown in the way of exporters by 
the Allies, the article went on thus : " For 
some years to come the means of extricating 
ourselves from this cruel predicament will 
consist in transporting the work of manu- 
facturing or refining our merchandise to a 
neutral country. We are now in a position 
to offer information and advice on this head 
to those German manufacturers who are work- 
ing for exportation, and we shall endeavour to 
extend our action in the future. We advise 
all those manufacturers who are desirous of 
developing their business in this way to enter 
into relations with us without delay." x 

1 Zeitschrift des Handelsvertragsvereins, March 30, 1915. 
Cf. also La Gazette de Lausanne and L'Idea Nazionale, 
December 5, 1915. 



800 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

The device is simple, and has hitherto been 
efficacious. In Switzerland the number of 
German firms is large and continues to augment. 
They are branches of German houses, and their 
aim is to further the interests of these. They 
mask their intentions by assuming Swiss names 
and also by obtaining for their employees 
naturalization papers in the little republic. 
How, it may be asked, do the Allies propose 
to thwart these manoeuvres ? They probably 
have not given the matter a moment's serious 
consideration. A Swiss journal of repute * 
published some time ago a characteristic letter 
received by a Swiss business man from a 
German textile manufacturer. One passage 
is worth reproducing : " The actual situation 
renders it impossible for us to maintain re- 
lations with our former customers. Hence, 
it is of the utmost importance for us to be 
informed respecting the commercial and finan- 
cial situation with a view to the resumption 
of our intercourse in a lucrative form after 
this long interruption. It is our intention, 
therefore, to have our products sold through 
a Swiss branch by Swiss agents." 2 

With their incorrigible disposition to judge 
others by themselves, the British people fancy 
that after the war a wave of liberalism will 
sweep over Germany, demolish the strong- 
holds of militarism there, and reveal a pacific, 
level-headed nation with whom it may be 
possible to hold friendly intercourse. This, 
to my thinking, is also a delusion. Even if 
the Kaiser and his environment were dislodged 
from their places, Germany's ideals, aims 

1 Neue Zurcher Zeitung. 

2 Neue Zurcher Zeitung, also Vldea Nazionale, 
December 5, 1915. 



THE FINAL ISSUE 301 

and strivings would remain unchanged. But 
the Kaiser and his Government are minded 
to leave nothing to chance. They, too, have 
their plans, which are simple and comprehen- 
sive, and would appear to have escaped the 
notice of British optimists. And yet they 
are well worth consideration. The Germans 
themselves put the matter thus — 

The enormous expenditure necessitated by 
the war will call for special financial legislation 
of which the keynote will be found in mono- 
polies. Now, the present German Finance 
Minister, who is a banker by training, intends 
that the monopolies to be created shall be 
effected, not by the unaided resources of the 
State, but by its co-operation with the inter- 
ested business men and banks. On this basis 
he is working at monopolies of cigarettes, life 
insurance and electric power. This complex 
arrangement is facilitated by the machinery of 
the banks and their peculiar activity. And 
here we touch upon one of the main sources 
whence German organization after the war 
will draw its vitality. It is on the operations 
of these financial institutions that it behoves 
us to lay stress. They are so many magnetic 
centres which attract nearly all the free 
capital of the country and then employ it as 
they think fit. And one momentous conse- 
quence of this command of money is the 
possession of almost unrestricted power over 
industrial enterprises, present and future. For 
it depends on the banks to extend these and to 
restrict the output of those in consonance with 
the economic policy pursued by the State. 

Nor should it be forgotten that the power 
and influence of the banks is not limited by 
the amount of capital they actually possess. 



802 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

Over and above this they wield all the financial 
force conferred by the vast amounts deposited 
with them by customers. This was evidenced 
in the case of the Banca Commerciale in Italy, 
which had a working capital of £6,240,000 in 
the year 1914. Now, of that sum only 2*5 
per cent, was owned by Germans, yet the 
bank itself and all the industries dependent 
on it were exploited by the German Board of 
Directors. 1 In the Fatherland we observe 
the same phenomenon. All the German banks 
together, excepting the hypothecary institu- 
tions, owned £195,000,000 sterling, about 44 
per cent, of which belonged to the eight prin- 
cipal banks of the empire. 2 Possessing only 
£86,050,000 of their own, they disposed of 
£259,600,000 belonging to other people. 

One effect of the establishment of groups 
of monopolies will be to increase the number 
of persons dependent for their livelihood on 
the State. It is calculated that the total, 
including heads of families, will amount to 
tens of millions. The corn monopoly will bring 
in five million farmers, heads of families, 
who will have to look to the State for the 
amount of their yearly income. For it is 
evident that the Government will be " co- 
operating" not with the peasants, but with the 
great landed proprietors. Now, these are the 
men whose backing is indispensable, and has 
never been wanting, to the military and court 

1 Giovanni Preziosi, La Germania alia Conquista d' 'Italia, 
2d edizione, p. 150. 

2 Deutsche Bank, 248 million marks ; Diskonto Gesell- 
schaft, 149 millions ; Dresdner Bank, 261 millions ; 
Darmstadter Bank, 192 millions ; Berliner Handelsg. 
145 millions; Commerz. u Diskonto Bank, 100 millions; 
Nationalbank, 98 millions ; Mitteldeutsche Kreditbank, 
69 million marks. 



THE FINAL ISSUE 303 

parties who are primarily responsible for the 
war. Once the wages of the workmen and the 
interest on capital become dependent on the 
State, the entire nation is but a vast machine 
worked by the men in power. To suppose 
that these will lend a willing ear to the demands 
for political liberty which are certain to be 
made after the conclusion of peace is to expect 
the impossible. What will probably happen 
is a keen struggle between the classes and the 
masses for the mastery, but until it is decided in 
favour of the latter, the Germany of the future 
will continue to be the Germany of to-day. 

In the meanwhile, the Teutons, despite 
their striking inferiority in numbers and 
resources, have kept the Great Powers of the 
world at bay, have defeated their armies, sunk 
their mercantile marine, occupied their terri- 
tory, drained their wealth, paralysed their 
trade and deprived them of all the odds which 
they owed to circumstance. Organization has 
thus more than made up for the seemingly 
overpowering advantages possessed by the 
Allies at the outset. That it will suddenly 
lose its worth during the remainder of the 
campaign is hardly to be expected. The con- 
tingency which we may have to face, if we 
continue to move at our present pace, is 
manifest to the observant student of politics. 

By the average man and our " leaders of 
men " it is hardly even suspected. Our easy- 
going optimism is largely the result of tem- 
perament and partly, too, of presumptuous 
confidence born of past luck, and in especial 
of the relief we feel at our escape from most 
of the obvious dangers that menaced us at 
the outset of the war. There has been no 
trouble over Ireland, no rising in India, no 



304 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

serious defection in South Africa, no invasion 
of Egypt. And we irrationally feel that these 
dark clouds, having drifted harmlessly past, 
the others will follow them. It was said of 
the Swiss in mediaeval times, that they were 
kept together by the bewilderment of men and 
the providence of God, confusione hominum 
et providentia Dei. The same might be truly 
predicated of the British people of to-day. 

But there is no reason for assuming that 
they will be thus providentially cared for in 
the future. The Allies have not yet driven 
the Germans out of Belgium, France, Serbia, 
Montenegro, Poland or Kurland. Neither have 
they contrived to starve them into sueing for 
peace. They talk glibly of exhausting them 
as though their own resources were inex- 
haustible. They do well perhaps to make light 
of the Zeppelins, but they pay far too little 
attention to the submarines, and seem not to 
realize the magnitude of the losses which these 
weapons have inflicted on our merchant ship- 
ping, nor to have calculated how long it can hold 
out at the present rate of destruction. Freights 
have increased enormously, and they have not 
yet reached the highest point they are likely to 
attain. Imports have been restricted, prices 
have gone up and taxation has increased. 
Time may not be on the side of our enemies, but 
is it on ours ? It is a fickle ally at best, and to 
rely on its support is to lean on a split reed. 

Optimism of the unreasoning kind preva- 
lent in Great Britain is unwarranted, whether 
we confine our view to the actual campaign or 
extend it to the greater struggle of which that 
forms but an episode. Taking the former case 
first, one is struck with certain considerations 
which, without inspiring dismay, ought surely to 



THE FINAL ISSUE 305 

preserve us from that excessive self-confidence 
which is too often a hindrance to fruitful 
exertion. The financial burden and its relation 
to the limits of the allied nations' capacity to 
bear it is a fit subject for meditation when we 
feel uplifted in self-complacency. Doubtless it 
is encouraging to watch the symptoms of slow 
exhaustion displaying themselves in the central 
empires and to speculate on the consequences 
of the further fall of the German mark. But 
these consequences we are too apt to ex- 
aggerate. For we misjudge the character, the 
staying powers, the ideals, the psychology of 
the German people. We fancy that because 
they have been reduced from comfort to hard- 
ship therefore they are on the verge of collapse. 
We imagine that because their commercial 
and industrial classes are keen on making 
money and ardently desire peace, they are 
also ready to purchase it by acquiescing in 
conditions which would dispel their dreams of 
world power. We feel certain that if Prussia 
and all the German States received genuine 
parliamentary government, the costly ambi- 
tions of the military party would forthwith be 
dispelled for all time. 

It is by delusions such as these that the 
British people were hoodwinked in the past, 
and it is by the same vain imaginings that 
they may be victimized in the future. For 
they seem incapable of gauging the German 
psyche. The two races meet each other in 
masks. The apparent ingenuousness of the 
English-speaking Teuton is calculated to throw 
the most vigilant Anglo-Saxon intelligence off 
its guard. We have no psychological X-rays 
by which to pierce the peculiar racial vesture 
in which the German soul is shrouded, nor 



306 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

are we endowed with the gift of patient ob- 
servation which might enable us to extract 
those rays from facts. And so we stumble 
along, dealing with an imaginary people whom 
we ourselves have created after our own image 
and likeness, falling into fatal blunders and 
recommencing anew. 

It is true that the mark has fallen, and that 
the German financial fabric is in a parlous 
condition. But that fabric is kept from 
crumbling away by the war, just as the Egyptian 
papyrus is preserved so long as it does not 
come into contact with the air. Moreover, 
common prudence should impel us to find out 
at what a cost to ourselves we have reduced 
the value of the mark. If financial exhaustion 
be among the ways in which one group of 
belligerents may be made to succumb, it is 
wise to ask whether it is the States which have 
to pay gold for their huge requirements or 
those which can get almost everything they 
need for paper that are likely to succumb first. 

The question is relevant, yet, because it has 
not been moved into the foreground of dis- 
cussion, there are few people who ponder on it. 

Personally, I am convinced that impecuni- 
osity and loss of credit will never bring the 
Germans to their knees. 

Great Britain has achieved wonders in the 
financial sphere during this war, as the Allies 
and certain neutrals can testify. Our budgets 
are monuments of the nation's spirit of self- 
sacrifice. But we have not come scathless 
out of the ordeal. And besides our inevitable 
losses we are suffering from criminal waste. No 
other country is so thriftless as ours. In this 
respect we are a byword among the peoples of 
the world. But we give no thought to the 



THE FINAL ISSUE 307 

consequences. Yet the yearly outlay on the 
one hand and the means of meeting it on the 
other hand are calculable, and it would be well 
if those who rely upon Germany's financial 
prostration would carefully reckon up and 
compare the two, were it only for the sake of 
the sobering effect. On this aspect of the 
problem it is needless to dwell further. It will 
compel close and painful attention before the 
end of the campaign. 

Another point to which inadequate heed has 
been paid, is the lack of working men. This 
dearth of labour is not felt in Germany or 
Austria, because they have two million prisoners 
and two million Poles on whom they can draw 
not only for agricultural work but also for 
skilled labour. And the authorities of both 
those empires are employing their war prisoners 
very freely. Here, as everywhere else, the 
Teuton is enterprising. I have seen photo- 
graphs of Russians in Germany harnessed and 
employed as beasts of burden. At any rate, 
it is no secret that from the latter half of the 
year 1915 Germany and Austria were far ahead 
of Great Britain, France, Russia, the United 
States and Japan combined in the amount of 
munitions they turned out every week. And 
they are still ahead of them to-day. This 
fact, which can be verified, has an ominous 
ring. What it connotes is that our enemies 
have no strikes, no conscientious objectors, 
no fiddling with obligatory service, industrial 
or military. Each man is at his country's 
beck and call. Germany is free from strikers, 
slackers and such-like anti-social types. 

In Russia the want of working men is felt 
keenly. It is one of the main elements of the 
sharp rise of prices there. In France, too, the 

X 2 



308 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

number of hands needed is very great, and 
the loss inflicted by their withdrawal from the 
labour market is more sensible than the average 
reader has any notion of. And far from being 
filled, these gaps are becoming wider day by 
day. This shortage is a source of solicitude 
to the Government of the Republic. 

What it portends may readily be imagined. 
It certainly compels us to qualify the cheering 
assertion that time is on our side. What else 
it implies may be left to the imagination of 
the reader. 

More serious still than the financial burden, 
or the dearth of workmen, is the inadequacy of 
the mercantile marine to the needs of the Allies 
in general, and of Great Britain in especial. 
To this privation submarine warfare has con- 
tributed materially. And there is not the 
slenderest ground for hope that the Germans 
will desist from it during this campaign. On 
the contrary, they will intensify it. Of the 
neutrals, some are too weak and others too 
timid to enter an energetic protest against this 
violation of international law. The freight- 
carrying capacity of the transports still avail- 
able is less than the British optimist realizes. 
How much less, it would be unfruitful to 
inquire. It is enough to know that in this 
matter, too, we had better seek a more helpful 
ally than time. Those who are most con- 
versant with these elements of the problem are 
haunted by a restive consciousness of dis- 
appointment and apprehension. 

For the power, the independence, the des- 
tinies of the Empire are interwoven with our 
command of the sea. On our merchant ton- 
nage depend our economic life, our army 
and navy, everything we have and are and 



THE FINAL ISSUE 309 

hope to be. That destroyed or paralysed, 
nothing remains but a memory. And the 
Germans are working hard and not unsuccess- 
fully to cripple it. During the week ending 
April 13, 85,000 tons of British and neutral 
shipping were destroyed. Since the beginning 
of the submarine blockade over 3,000,000 tons 
have been sent to the bottom of the sea. 
On an average 50,000 tons a week are being 
torpedoed or mined, and our losses tend to 
augment rather than diminish. Nor is that 
all. Not only is our merchant tonnage being 
whittled down below the minimum needed for 
our strict requirements, but we are also being 
hindered from utilizing the transports available. 
And herein lies a danger the full significance 
of which has not yet received proper attention. 
Shortage of labour is pleaded as the reason why 
effective measures have not been adopted to fill 
the gaps made by the enemy submarines. And 
labour is inadequate because the Government 
eschewes industrial as well as military compul- 
sion. It possesses the power, but shrinks from 
wielding it. To my thinking, this is one of the 
symptoms of that madness with which the gods 
strike a nation before destroying it. 

And the longer this process of — shall we call 
it mutual? — exhaustion goes on, the more im- 
portant grow the neutral States and the 
louder sound their voices. They are like 
Jeshurun, who waxed fat and kicked. With- 
out special aptitudes for arithmetic one may 
calculate, with a rough approach to accuracy, 
the time when the process of mutual exhaustion 
will enable the neutrals to exert an absurdly 
disproportionate and possibly dangerous in- 
fluence over the belligerents. That is a calcula- 
tion which those optimists would do well to 



310 OURSELVES AND GERMANY 

make who tell us that all is well because " time 
is on our side." 

It is still open to us to utilize our superior 
resources, realize our latent strength, and ward 
off the dangers that beset us. But the first 
advance towards the goal must be to face the 
facts, behold things and persons as they are, and 
apply our new-found knowledge to the work of 
self-rescue. Our conception of the nature of 
the contest in which we are engaged must be re- 
cast. Our demands on our national leaders — 
not those now in power who only mislead — 
must be greatly enlarged. Truth, however 
bitter, must take the place of fancy. Ideas 
and institutions incongruous with the new 
social and political conditions must be dis- 
placed. The nation's aims and policy should 
be stated boldly and clearly, and adequate 
machinery set up to achieve them. In a word, 
system will have to be substituted for con- 
fusion, method for haphazard. Destitute of 
a great or strong man, it behoves us to imitate 
our enemy and create a vast organization with 
branches all over the empire. But the influence 
of the government ever since the outbreak of 
the war has militated against all those reforms. 

If these changes had been effected at the 
outset the story of the present campaign would 
have been different from what it is. A group 
of belligerents representing only 5,921,000 
square kilometres of territory and 150,199,000 
inhabitants, or, say, 4 per cent, of dry land 
and 9*1 per cent, of human beings, would not 
have held its own for twenty-one months 
against a group disposing of 68,031,000 square 
kilometres of territory and a population of 
770,060,000, or 46 per cent, of the land on the 
globe and 47 per cent, of the human race. 



THE FINAL ISSUE 311 

Providence has bestowed upon the Allies the 
wherewithal to attain their legitimate ends. 
The Allies' leaders are frittering them away. 

For the thirty years of preparation do not 
afford us an adequate explanation of the 
Teuton superiority. The clue is to be found in 
the psychological factor. Germany is wholly 
alive, physically, intellectually and psychically. 
And she lives in the present and future. We 
either drowse or vegetate in and for the past. 
She has the decisive advantage of possessing 
organization and organizers. Therein lies the 
secret of her sustained success. The Allies 
lack both, and are hardly conscious of the 
necessity of making good the deficiency. 
Therein lies their weakness. It has made 
itself felt throughout the campaign and will 
determine the upshot of the war. And in the 
politico-economic struggle that will follow the 
war, it is the same psychological factor which the 
Allies rate so low that will decide the final issue. 

Unless we wake up to the reality and readjust 
our ideas and methods to that — and of such 
awakening there is as yet no sure token — the 
outcome of the present war will be a draw, and 
the final upshot of the larger contest will be 
our utter defeat. No journalistic optimism, no 
ministerial magniloquence can alter that. These 
contingencies are already fullfronting us, as we 
shall soon learn to our cost, and the people who 
are veiling them from the public view, however 
praiseworthy their intentions may be, are leading 
the nation to ruin. And if we continue to uphold 
our present chiefs and methods national disaster 
is as inevitable as destiny. But it is well to 
remember that it is not Fate that is pursuing 
us ; it is we who are overtaking Fate. 



B 



^ ^ 







Deacidified using the Bookkeeper prw 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: .... GO 1 

MA' 

PreservationTechnolog 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVA 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 1 6066 






*o V 


cS°^ 


*°% 







